Detroit Red Wings: Shootout Struggles Are Starting to Affect Team Psyche

For how much better the Detroit Red Wings have been as a team this season over last season, one might be tempted to overlook the team's struggles in the shootout.

Unfortunately, the shootout woes have started to affect Detroit's team psyche, as the Wings have looked empty and lacked offensive punch over the past four games. 

The Wings have lost four in a row, but three of those four have been via a shootout. Normally, Red Wings fans could pull the "at least we got a point" approach, but the struggles in a shootout seem to somehow have affected Detroit's in-game offense as well. 

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With just four goals in their past four games, if the Red Wings are looking for answers, they should start by trying to bury the hatchet with this season's shootout problems. Whether this means only practicing shootouts or seeing a sports psychologist, it is clear that Detroit (as a team) is playing far below where anyone expected it to be in shootouts this season.

Detroit's six shootout losses are the most in the NHL this season. While the team does have a win in the shootout, it was backup goaltender Petr Mrazek who picked up the victory in that one.

Jimmy Howard has the NHL's worst record (0-6) and worst save percentage in shootouts this season, stopping just 26.7 percent of shots against him and giving up 11 goals on 15 attempts in the process.

It looked like Detroit might finally stop the bleeding last night against Columbus after going up 1-0 on Pavel Datsyuk's goal in the first round of the shootout. But Howard couldn't find a way to stop Ryan Johansen or Boone Jenner, and neither Gustav Nyquist nor Henrik Zetterberg could light the lamp at the other end. 

So how can Detroit become better in shootouts? It is anyone's guess right now, but the Wings look like a far cry from the team that won seven out of eight games just a week ago.

Head coach Mike Babcock has been up for the challenge of figuring out a way to revive this Detroit Red Wings team, which was predicted by some analysts to miss the playoffs this year. Now he will have to figure out a new way of getting the most from his players in the shootout. 

The immediate future of his squad depends on it.