Are Sharks mentally tough enough to prevent breakdown?

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Can the Red Wings do this?



Can they become the third NHL team to win a best-of-seven postseason series after losing the first three games?

They took the first step Thursday night, beating San Jose, 7-1, thanks to Johan Franzen's ability to score while doing his taxes and pulling the moon closer to Earth. But let's face it: That was the easiest step. The Wings were playing for their season, and the Sharks were playing so they could get a couple extra days off.

We all know why this is highly unlikely -- winning three straight games against one of the best teams in the NHL is hard. The Wings can't leave anything to chance. They need rookie goalie Jimmy Howard to be near his best for each game, as he was in Game 4. Howard has been great at times this postseason, but chances are he'll have one more off night before this series ends.

Plus, two of the last three games are in San Jose.

OK, so this probably won't happen. But if you're a Wings fan, I assume you want to believe -- that's part of the fun of being a fan. So let's change the question from "Can the Wings do this?" to "How can the Wings do this?"

Franzen never met a camera lens he liked; he is one of the most shy stars in Detroit. But he said something simple and insightful Thursday night -- more insightful than he even realized.

He said the Wings didn't make this a series by winning Game 4, but they can make it a series by winning Game 5.

Think of how true that is in this series.

The Sharks have an awful playoff history -- they have heard rumors about something called the "Western Conference finals," but they haven't been able to confirm them. So the first thing the Wings have to do is use the impossibility of this comeback against San Jose.

If the Sharks have to return to Detroit for Game 6, they will have to either a) clinch the series in Detroit, or b) hear everybody in the NHL say they are the biggest chokers in NHL history.

Right now, the story of this series is whether the Wings can survive. If the Wings win Game 5, the story becomes whether the Sharks are choking.

If the Wings win Game 5, the conversation changes dramatically.

Big comebacks start in small ways. If the Wings score the first goal in Game 5, they have a huge psychological edge in that one. If they planted some doubt in San Jose's head with a Game 4 blowout, maybe it pays off early in Game 5.

We don't know if they planted a seed in Game 4. San Jose coach Todd McLellan seemed to think his team took the night off Thursday -- that the Sharks talked about finishing the Wings but were really thinking about finishing their postgame meals.

"We can talk about it as much as we want," McLellan said. "It went into our ears and rattled around up there, but it didn't settle in. Maybe this spanking we got here tonight can wake us up. We're in a hell of a series."

They're actually not in a hell of a series yet. But if the Sharks lose Game 5 at home, they will be. If they lose Game 5, then Game 6 will be played in their heads before it's played on the ice.

The Sharks might be the better team on the ice. We'll find out soon about their heads.

 

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Red Wings look ahead to Game 5 -- and only Game 5


- The Red Wings spent a leisurely morning at home Friday, then took an afternoon flight to San Jose, opting not to practice in hopes that rest and relaxation will keep them fresh for what looms as the series' toughest game.


The Wings lived to play again tonight at HP Pavilion after demolishing the Sharks, 7-1, Thursday at Joe Louis Arena in a game where they couldn't enter the Sharks' zone without the red light flashing.

Every time Johan Franzen touched the puck it went in the net, every time Todd Bertuzzi made a pass it ended in a goal. The Wings led, 5-0, after the first period, 6-1, after the second.

Instead of a 3-0 series deficit, it's a 3-1 deficit, which means the same thing -- if the Wings don't win tonight, they're done, and that Game 4 performance will be noteworthy only for the record Franzen set.

"Our team has to come out with that same desperation again, whether it's on the road and you're in a hostile environment," Nicklas Lidstrom said. "You have to come out with a good push again and play real well defensively. We did what we had to do, but we've got to go into San Jose and do the same thing again."

That won't be easy, because the downside to such a lopsided victory is this: The Sharks learned from that game, too. They learned they can't just say all the right things, like they did the morning of Game 4; they have to back up their words. And as much as this is a team that has collapsed under its own playoff expectations in recent years, these Sharks already have overcome adversity once this spring -- when they shrugged off fluky bounces that left them trailing in their first-round series against Colorado to clinch it in six games.

They're smarter, they're more experienced, and they've got a coach who won't put up with a repeat of Game 4.

"We've done two things now," coach Todd McLellan said. "We've talked about it, but we've also experienced it. There are no other tools that we can use to convey the message. We have to go out and play the way we can, or the way we did in the first three games, to be successful."Much is made of McLellan's ties to Detroit, where he was an assistant in 2005-08. He has instilled in the Sharks the same mentality the Wings have, a belief in patience and perseverance. The Sharks rallied from third-period deficits in Game 2 and Game 3 to win both nights, and with three chances left, they're confident this is their series to win.


"You learn and you build from it, and that's the whole process we talk about in the playoffs," defenseman Rob Blake said. "We kind of learned that we had a game plan and we had some structure the first three games, and it got away from us and it cost us."

Can the Wings win tonight? Absolutely. They're 3-3 on the road in the 2010 playoffs, though none of those victories came in San Jose. They've put on their best performances when needed, like in Game 7 at Phoenix and like Thursday.

The Wings used a simple strategy for Game 4: Win the first period, win the second, then win the game. One down. Next one up.

"That's just what we'll try to do," coach Mike Babcock said. "Take it one day at a time and see if we can't put some pressure back on San Jose."