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PHOENIX (Ticker) -- Darren McCarty and Brendan Shanahan scored on the first two shots of the night for the Detroit Red Wings, who extended their unbeaten streak over the Phoenix Coyotes to 10 games with a 5-3 victory. Tomas Holmstrom, Kirk Maltby and defenseman Nicklas Lidstrom had the other goals for Detroit, which is 6-0-4 against Phoenix since January 31, 2000. McCarty put the Red Wings in front for good just 18 seconds into the opening period when he put a backhander from the low slot under the right pad of goaltender Brian Boucher. It was the sixth goal for McCarty, surpassing his total for all of last season. "You always like to get off to a good start," McCarty said. "Anytime you can score the first minute of a period or the last minute, it gives you a good lift. We got a couple of goals quickly on the first couple of shifts and then we got one at the end of the second. They were big goals." Just 79 seconds later, Shanahan got a cross-ice pass from Sergei Fedorov in the left faceoff circle and put a wrist shot between Boucher's right arm and body for his eighth goal. "Tonight, I thought I was part of the reason we got off to a bad start," Boucher said. "I didn't particularly get off to a good start. Early on, we let in those two goals, goals I think I could've had. I think the guys should hold their heads high. We played a good game. If anyone didn't pull their load, I think it was me." The Coyotes got within a goal three times before Lidstrom scored Detroit's league-leading eighth shorthanded tally into an empty net with 13 seconds remaining. Lidstrom's clincher came seconds after Curtis Joseph got his left pad on a deflection by Ladislav Nagy. Joseph also gobbled up defenseman Danny Markov's wrister from the left circle with Phoenix on a 6-on-4 advantage and finished with 27 saves. "We did a good job of answering after they answered us," McCarty said. "Every time they got to within a goal, we got a two-goal lead back." Andrei Nazarov, Tony Amonte and Shane Doan scored for the Coyotes, who have just one win in the last nine games and are 0-3-3-1 in their last seven at home. "The guys battled hard and they could've wilted, but we gave ourselves a chance to win. The moral of the story is you can't make mistakes against any team, let alone a team like Detroit," Phoenix coach Bob Francis said. Nazarov got a goal back for the Coyotes before the end of the first period, but Tomas Holmstrom tipped Jason Woolley's shot past Boucher for a power-play goal just 51 seconds into the second. "(Holmstrom) has been deflecting shots, but they haven't been going in," Red Wings coach Dave Lewis said. "He has been paying the price to do that." Tony Amonte cut Phoenix's deficit to 3-2 midway through the period, but defenseman Radoslav Suchy could not control a loose puck in front of his own net and Kirk Maltby backhanded it between the pads of a crouching Boucher with four-tenths of a second to go. "I just saw it there and got a quick backhand away, and I think it caught me off-guard and I think it caught Boucher off-guard and went five-hole," Maltby said. "We have been on the other end of those late goals and it shows you, you don't quit until the whistle blows." "You can survive one mistake on a play, but it is difficult to survive two, let alone three or four, particularly in the last five seconds of a period," Francis said. Doan got the Coyotes within 4-3 with 6:36 to play in the third, finishing a give-and-go with Daymond Langkow and scoring his 12th goal. |
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