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Red Wings push Ducks’ skid to 12 games

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The Red Wings scored three goals in the third to rally back and beat the Ducks, extending their losing streak to 12.

Anaheim Ducks GM Bob Murray gave head coach Randy Carlyle (the deadly?) vote of confidence and shipped Andrew Cogliano out of town, but playing against the struggling Detroit Red Wings did little to change this team’s path.

Despite Rickard Rakell scoring the opening goal, the Ducks dropped their 12th game in a row, as the Red Wings fired off three unanswered goals to win 3-1 on Tuesday.

Since beating the Pittsburgh Penguins 4-2 to improve to 19-11-5 on Dec. 17, the Ducks have gone 0-8-4 to slide down to 19-19-9, leaving them outside of the West’s eight playoff spots, and in a position of significant uncertainty in the conference’s clogged bubble races. So this could be a full month-long losing streak if the Ducks can’t beat the Minnesota Wild in their next game on Thursday, Jan. 17.

This wasn’t exactly the effort of a desperate team trying to save their coach’s job (and avoid further trades), as the Red Wings actually narrowly edged the Ducks in shots on goal at 25-24.

All three of the Red Wings’ goals happened in the third period. Anthony Mantha tied it up a little less than six minutes into the final frame after Rakell’s second-period goal, while Gustav Nyquist collected the game-winner with 4:16 left in the third. Darren Helm then added the insurance goal.

Things might not get much easier for Anaheim in the near future, as this loss represented the second game of a five-game road trip, and after one home date, they must endure another road run:

Thu., Jan. 17: at Minnesota
Sat., Jan. 19: at New Jersey
Sun., Jan. 20: at Islanders
Wed., Jan. 23: vs St. Louis
Sat., Feb. 2: at Winnipeg
Mon., Feb. 4: at Toronto
Tue., Feb. 5: at Montreal
Thu., Feb. 7: at Ottawa
Sat., Feb. 9: at Philadelphia

Ouch.

We’ll find out soon enough if something else gives with the Ducks, whether that means yet another trade, or even a coaching change. It’s fair to wonder if there’s much anyone can do, as even all-world goalie John Gibson has no longer been able to stop the bleeding.

James O’Brien is a writer for Pro Hockey Talk on NBC Sports. Drop him a line at phtblog@nbcsports.com or follow him on Twitter @cyclelikesedins.