Wings 4, Blues 4

Steve Thomas, who provided the spark the Wings needed early in the third, watches Brett Hull's tying goal go in last night at St. Louis The Wings' four-game winning streak was ended last night when they tied the Blues 4-4 in St. Louis though they remain undefeated in their last five. They scored four goals in the third period to come back from a 3-0 deficit and then a 4-2 deficit, sending the game to overtime and holding off the Blues to remain in first place in the Central Division. Dominik Hasek made the start for the Wings and honestly did not look very good. He was shaky the whole night and let in some iffy goals. I had very little confidence in his ability to make a save, which is unusual because I'm usually highly confident when he's between the pipes. Last night was different, however, and I very much wish the Wings had stuck with Manny Legace. Hasek has to get into the lineup again but last night was far to important a game to have someone who hadn't played in almost a month start. Dominik was not alone in his mediocrity. The rest of the Wings frankly sucked for two periods and until they got something going in the third, they were completely outplayed. The Blues were the only ones to take the game seriously and they played with a heck of a lot more emotion and drive than the Wings did for 40 minutes. The Wings had won their last four games by playing complete, or almost complete, games for the most part but they threw that out the window for some unknown reason. I guess playing the night before didn't help and neither did having that game go to easily for them but I still don't see much of an excuse. Last night was a very important game and they should have been able to pull off a win, tired or not. As it was, they only got a tie because of some fortunate Blues mistakes. The Wings' scored their second goal because a Blues player deflected Steve Yzerman's shot into the net and their third goal was a result of the Blues defenseman knocking the puck off Pavel Datsyuk's stick into the net. I don't think Datsyuk was even trying to shoot, it looked more like he was trying to deke around Osgood and backhand it in, following his old "pass first, deke second, pass third and then shoot" philosophy we all thought he was getting away from. The Wings got lucky that their third period hard work paid off like it did because it probably should have come to nothing. It was nice to see Pavel Datsyuk make up for his glaring mistake which led directly to the Blues' 4th goal by scoring a goal of his own, even if he didn't score it directly himself. I thought for sure the Wings would deflate after Pronger scored and I was really mad at Pavel for coughing up the puck like that in the Wings zone at such a crucial point in the game. Steve Thomas continues to amaze me and was the spark that got the Wings going, scoring a goal 40.5 seconds into the third period. He has turned out to be a perfect fit for the Wings and the rest of the league really missed out by not signing him. More proof that the Wings can rejuvenate careers just as well as the Rangers can ruin them. Brett Hull scored the game-tying goal and is now one goal away from tying Marcel Dionne for third place all-time in goals scored. He is as clutch as they come and one of the greatest player's ever. Last night's goal, while it barely got over the line, was huge and shocked St. Louis fans. That was one disappointed and frustrated set of people after the game, for sure. The only thing that made being forced to watch the game on ESPN tolerable (I hate Gary Thorne and Company) was seeing Hullie on the Hot Seat during the first intermission. Overtime was exciting and the Wings came very close to winning the game, most notably when The Captain did his rush which Brian described. The Blues came close too, especially the time when Dom was stupidly flopping around and Jiri Fischer had to make the save for him. The Wings stole one away from the Blues last night for sure, even if it was just a tie. I would have much preferred a win but a tie still keeps the Wings a head so it's fine. The season series is also tied right now, 1-1-1. The Wings are now 15-9-3-0, just two points in front of the Blues still. Freep | News | ESPN | Box Score Next up: @ Toronto, Saturday, 7:00 EST