Detroit City Wire

The Detroit Red Wings were defeated by the New York Islanders, 7-2, at UBS Arena on Wednesday night. This loss marked the second game in as many nights for Detroit and their first back-to-back set of the 2025-26 season.

Red Wings captain Dylan Larkin commented on the team's performance, saying, “Just from the start, a lack of execution. A lack of showing up here, with it being on a back-to-back. We made it very easy on them, and they capitalized. Then we just chased it and let it get more and more out of hand. To a man, it wasn’t good enough tonight. We didn’t execute a back-to-back here, sticking to our strategy and making it easy, playing a simple game.”

Detroit’s goalie Cam Talbot made 23 saves in his fifth appearance this season. The Red Wings had just come off a 4-2 loss to the Buffalo Sabres less than 24 hours earlier. For New York, goaltender David Rittich stopped 31 shots as the Islanders secured their fourth consecutive win.

Red Wings head coach Todd McLellan addressed the team’s difficulties during this road trip: “On this road trip, we haven’t done a real good job of handling [adversity]. That’s a huge area of growth for this team. When it doesn’t go your way, how do you respond? We didn’t start well in Buffalo last night, but we responded a little better as the night went on. Here, we didn’t start well and never got it going. Certainly, there’s the on-ice product that has to be worked on, but there’s the between-the-ears part that has to be managed as well.”

The Islanders took an early lead when Tony DeAngelo scored after receiving a pass from Anders Lee just over two minutes into the game. Emil Heineman added another goal for New York later in the first period following an odd-man rush initiated by Bo Horvat.

Jean-Gabriel Pageau increased New York's lead to three goals early in the second period after scoring off a pass from Lee. Coach McLellan noted defensive issues: “Our puck management through the neutral zone or in the offensive zone led to multiple rushes going the other way,” he said. “Our sort-out coming into our end was nonexistent, really. They found the fourth man, the third man. They scored off rebounds. Areas that we worked on, tried to put time into, corrected or thought we corrected after Game 1, they showed up tonight.”

Detroit challenged an Islanders goal for goaltender interference late in the second period but lost; New York led 4-0 after Kyle Palmieri deflected Ryan Pulock's shot past Talbot. Mathew Barzal then extended New York's advantage with a breakaway goal before intermission.

Larkin ended Rittich's shutout bid early in the third period with his eighth goal of the season during Detroit’s fourth power play opportunity—extending his point streak to eight games—with assists from Emmitt Finnie and Alex DeBrincat.

Heineman scored again for New York midway through the third period before Simon Holmstrom added another less than half a minute later for a 7-1 lead.

Jonatan Berggren scored Detroit's second goal late in regulation after receiving a pass from J.T. Compher; rookie Michael Brandsegg-Nygård recorded his first NHL point with an assist.

Looking ahead to Saturday’s home game against St. Louis Blues at Little Caesars Arena before embarking on another road trip next week, Larkin said Friday would be used to regroup: “We got to figure it out on the road,” he said. “It’s going to be a tough trip. We got to find energy, get our spirit going, get everyone involved and win hockey games as a team.”

When asked about Detroit’s offensive output given Wednesday’s scoreline McLellan said: “We didn’t generate enough early. It gets to 7-1, or whatever it was—it’s garbage time...not enough from a lot of players offensively as well.”

Asked whether travel contributed to their struggles Larkin responded: “You got to be ready to go...A lack of playing a simple game...We left our goalie out to dry.”

On facing New York specifically Larkin added: “They play a hard game...They won face-offs, net-front battles and battles all over the ice...We made it pretty easy on them.”