Justin Abdelkader, Gustav Nyquist (two), Darren Helm and David Booth scored for the Wings while Patrik Laine tallied for the Jets.
The Wings outshot the Jets 16-3 in the first period and 32-26 for the game.
The win snapped Detroit's seven-game losing streak. The Wings are now 11-12-5 overall and 5-5-4 at home.
The Jets are 17-7-4 overall and 7-5-3 on the road.
1. Gustav Nyquist: After the Wings failed to score during 1:55 worth of a two-man advantage during the first period, Nyquist restored Detroit's momentum by scoring at 14:43 on a rebound of Tomas Tatar's shot. Niklas Kronwall got the second assist. In the third period, Nyquist was involved in a controversial goal at 4:55. Jonathan Ericsson's shot went in the net but the play underwent two reviews, one for a high stick and the other for goaltender interference. Nyquist was the one who was pushed on top of Connor Hellebuyck by Josh Morrissey so it was ruled a good goal. Nyquist was credited with his second of the game and eighth of the season. Nyquist is now tied with Tatar in goals. Anthony Mantha leads the team with 12. Nyquist, who also assisted on Abdelkader's goal, finished a team-best plus-4.
Quotable: "I wasn't sure, I thought it was kind of a 50-50. I don't know, I'd have to hear their explanation. I'm just trying to get in front of the net, I don't even know that the puck's coming in there. I feel like I get pushed in, I'm trying to get out of the blue paint and he kind of keeps me in there but it was nice to see it count." - Nyquist
2. Two-man advantage: You always want to score on your two-man advantage opportunities but only one team was able to do so Tuesday night. The Wings had the first chance as Morrissey and Tyler Myers both ended up in the box five seconds apart in the first. The Wings had three shots but were unable to score. The Jets had a chance when Dylan Larkin and Abdelkader were in the box early in the second. They only needed 22 seconds of their 5-on-3 for Laine to unleash his cannon of a shot from the left circle. The goal was Laine's 14th of the season. The Wings again had a two-man advantage for 1:05 as Morrissey and Myers again ended up in the penalty box but the Wings could only muster one shot.
Quotable: "No doubt, you get that long 5-on-3 and it can be easy to deflate you for sure. I thought on that 5-on-3 we had lots of chances, lots of shots. There was a chance to build momentum. But to score right there was huge, otherwise it's a psychological warfare on yourself a little bit." - Wings coach Jeff Blashill
3. Jimmy Howard: Howard did not have a lot of work in the first period as the Jets were limited to three shots, but he came up big the rest of the game. There was not a lot he could do on Laine's goal with the two-man advantage but Howard had to stop Dmitry Kulikov on a shot and rebound, Joel Aria on a partial breakaway and Kyle Connor on a good chance at the net. That was just in the second period. In the third, Howard stopped Dustin Byfuglien during a Jets' power play. Howard improved to 9-8-4 in 23 starts this season and was named third star of the game.
Quotable: "Howie's been pretty great for us all season long. He's one of the reasons that we're in a lot of games and won a lot of games because of how well he's been playing. Obviously we need that from our goalie and today he showed that he can play great hockey tonight. We're going to need that moving forward." - Darren Helm
