Trending: Third-period lull dooms Wings against Devils

NEWARK-- It doesn't matter who you're playing in this league, you can never take your foot off the gas. The Red Wings did for a four-minute span in the third period and it cost them the game as the New Jersey Devils scored four unanswered goals en route to a 4-1 victory at Prudential Center Thursday night.

Andreas Athanasiou (power play) scored the lone goal for the Wings.
Andy Greene, Wayne Simmonds (two, one power play) and Jesper Bratt scored for the Devils.
Detroit goaltender Jonathan Bernier (12-16-2) made 22 saves.
New Jersey netminder Mackenzie Blackwood (18-12-7) had 25 saves.
Up next for the Wings is a back-to-back afternoon road set Saturday in Boston against the Bruins and Sunday in Pittsburgh against the Penguins.
The Devils will complete their home-road back-to-back set Friday night in Carolina against the Hurricanes.
1. Andreas Athanasiou: Athanasiou did not score in his first three games after returning from missing 13 games with injury. But in his last three, he has been increasingly dangerous. Athanasiou scored twice in the team's 3-1 victory over the Bruins on Sunday, including a power-play tally. The Red Wings had three mostly ineffective power plays before finally connecting on their fourth. At 16:34 of the second, Anthony Mantha slid a drop pass to Athanasiou in the right circle and Athanasiou fired a shot past Blackwood for his eighth goal of the season and third in the last three games. Filip Hronek picked up the second assist. The goal snapped Blackwood's shutout streak at 171:37. Athanasiou finished with 19 shifts for 12:10, had three shots, one hit, one giveaway, was 1-for-2 in face-offs and was minus-1.

Quotable: "We've talked about it a lot this year. When they got one, they got another and they got another. We were on our heels. The past couple of weeks, I thought we've been playing on our toes and generating a lot, turning over the puck and playing in the O-zone a lot, especially in the third period. That's not the way we wanted to come out in the third with a one-goal lead." - Dylan Larkin
Quotable II: "I've said it lots. To get better as a group, and to get better individually, you gotta take steps forward, with as few steps backwards as you can. I think we've taken a good number of steps forward. Tonight we took steps backward. How do you handle it? You come out against Boston on Saturday and you make sure you take steps in the right direction." - Wings coach Jeff Blashill
2. Third-period woes: Generally, it has been the second period that has been problematic for the Red Wings. But they certainly haven't been spectacular in the third. But it was a truly tough stretch for them as the Devils scored four times in a four-minute span to go from a 1-0 deficit to a 4-1 lead. Greene kicked off the offensive burst, firing the puck from the left point as Simmonds screened Bernier at 5:10. At 6:54, Simmonds benefited from some slick passing from Miles Wood and Pavel Zacha, burying the puck from the doorstep. Then Simmonds chopped the rebound in at 8:37 as the Devils had the power play. Simmonds now has 250 career goals. At 9:10, Bratt scored from the left point as Travis Zajac screened Bernier.

Quotable: "I thought we stopped skating totally. I thought the game was loose in the first but I thought we had jump at least. We were good on the forecheck at times. We created some opportunities. We were outshooting them pretty good. They had two posts. It wasn't like it was a one-way game. But I thought we had jump. The second was obviously all special teams for the most part. And in the third, we just stopped skating. We stopped playing. We deserved what we got." - Blashill
Quotable II: "It's just little things that we have in our game where we're making it too easy for them to generate, and too easy for them to come on rushes and come in waves. When they get one, we have to lock it down. And we have to manage the puck. We had our chances. I had a chance with Helmer and Mo. I gotta slide it over, or put it in the net and it didn't go in the net. It comes back down and they score four unanswered goals. That's the hockey game. We have to generate. When it gets tough, we have to find a way to lock it down and not give them the next chance and definitely not give them the next goal." - Larkin
Quotable III: "I don't know. It's tough to say. To be honest, I don't really know what happened on the second one, a cross-ice pass and a backdoor play. I don't know if someone fell. It's tough to say for me right now. We'll have to look at it. We just got to stick to our game plan and it doesn't matter if they score two quick ones, or one, you just got to keep playing the way we definitely played some really good hockey in the first and the second. We just got to find a way to come in the third and be confident we're going to win 1-0 or 2-0." - Bernier
3.Special teams: Until the third period, the Red Wings had been solid on the penalty kill and needed to be as they took one penalty in the first and four straight in the second. It wasn't until the final frame that the penalty kill faltered as Simmonds got his second goal of the game, capitalizing on a rebound. The Wings also had their own chances with the man-advantage before Athanasiou's goal but were not able to generate anything more than that goal, finishing 1-for-4.
Quotable: "Penalty kill I thought did a good job. Bernie made some big saves when he had to but when you take that many penalties it really makes it tough on you. But it can always disrupt flow. You get through that, I don't think we executed enough down the stretch to put any sustained pressure on them." - Abdelkader
Quotable II: "The whole game, it was a sloppy game but you gotta find a way. We had chances. I had chances upon chances. We didn't get that second one or third one, and it came back to haunt us. Bernie's been playing great but we can't just win 1-0 games every game. We gotta put the puck in the net. We gotta capitalize on our chances. When we get a power play, we gotta go out there and build momentum. And when we're defending, we gotta watch our sticks and stay more disciplined than we did tonight." - Larkin
Quotable III: "Yeah, it was tough, second period, especially. I think we took three back to back PK, then guys not on the PK don't see a lot of ice time and guys on the PK are getting pretty tired. We just have to be better, stay out of the box for sure." - Bernier
Quotable IV:"They had the same thing. They had some kills. At the end of the day, we gotta play way better. We just stopped playing. I don't have an answer for why exactly. My job is to try to fix it but I don't have an answer for why. I know we stopped skating." - Blashill