Compher scores twice, Red Wings surge past Jets

WINNIPEG -- J.T. Compher scored two of the Detroit Red Wings’ five unanswered goals in a 5-1 win against the Winnipeg Jets at Canada Life Centre on Saturday.

“I think J.T. is a little bit like a Swiss Army knife,” Detroit coach Todd McLellan said. “You can use him in a lot of different situations. He’s a good right-handed face-off guy, fairly responsible defensively. We use him penalty-killing, and a little bit of power-play time, and we’d like to see him get rewarded. He’s had so many chances lately and it finally went in for him tonight. Those were big goals to get us even, get us the lead, and we could play from there.”

Lucas Raymond and Marco Kasper each had a goal and an assist, and John Gibson made 26 saves to win his eighth straight start for the Red Wings (32-16-5), who have a five-game point streak (4-0-1). Andrew Copp had two assists.

“[Gibson’s] been awesome, even [goaltender Cam Talbot] has been really good too,” Kasper said. “We know that if you let a shot go through they can make an unreal save, and they've been really good for us, and that's really important.”

Detroit forward Patrick Kane had an assist to reach 1,373 NHL points and is two points from passing Mike Modano for the most by a United States-born player.

Cole Koepke scored for the Jets (20-24-7), who have lost four of five (1-2-2). Connor Hellebuyck made 26 saves.

“That game didn’t turn,” Winnipeg coach Scott Arniel said. “That was one of the most embarrassing games for me in the last month. All of us. That was an embarrassing game. We were looking for a pond hockey, don’t get hit, don’t hit anybody, just play an easy, soft game, and that is pretty much what we did for two periods and then, it exploded in the third.

“We are fighting for our lives, and we go out and lay that egg. It is not good enough. It was the last game in the homestand and, you know what? We are heading out on the road for some real tough buildings, and that was two points we needed badly and it wasn’t good enough.”

Koepke gave Winnipeg a 1-0 lead at 10:08 of the first period. Following a face-off win by Morgan Barron in the left circle, Logan Stanley took a slap shot from the point that hit Koepke in the slot before the forward turned and backhanded the loose puck into the open right side of the net.

“Offensive draw, and Barron did a good job of winning it clean back, and we were just getting bodies to the net,” Koepke said. “And Stanley did a good job delivering it, and it went off me and kind of landed there perfect for me.”

Koepke’s goal ended a span of 235:48 between 5-on-5 goals for the Jets, dating to a 4-3 overtime loss to the Toronto Maple Leafs on Jan. 17, when Nino Niederreiter scored at 2:28 of the third period.

“We're in a spot where we can't really just sit here and be like, ‘Well, we played good but we didn't win,’” Koepke said. “We're in a spot now where we need to get every single point. … Tonight, tie game going to the third, and [we] let it get out of hand. And that's just kind of unacceptable for where we're at right now.”

Compher tied it 1-1 at 15:50 of the second period, five seconds after a Red Wings power play expired. Copp won a battle for the puck behind the net and pushed it in front, where Compher jammed it in off Hellebuyck’s pad.

“[Kane] and [Copp] make a great entry on the power play,” Compher said. “And then just kind of hard work behind the net to get it in front to me.”

Compher then put Detroit up 2-1 at 1:43 of the third, finishing a 3-on-2 rush with Emmitt Finnie and James van Riemsdyk.

“Two really nice plays by my linemates for the second one,” Compher said. “[Van Riemsdyk] at the line with a nice sauce pass, and then [Finnie] put it right on my tape, so two easy ones just going to the net tonight.”

Raymond pushed the lead to 3-1 at 8:11 when his sweeping shot from in front deflected off Hellebuyck’s stick, popped over the goalie and went in off the crossbar.

“It’s easy to point out the third period and the way we played there, but I thought the first and second we learned to deal with frustration a little bit,” McLellan said. “We had some shifts go our way, some shifts that didn’t. A little bit of frustration. I think that was good frustration; guys are pushing each other now and they’re getting a little upset when it’s not going their way. But we needed to channel it the right way and we did that in the third.”

Alex DeBrincat shot into an empty net to make it 4-1 at 18:11, and Kasper scored on the rush at 18:43 for the 5-1 final.

“Just battling back -- we definitely didn't play one of our more clean games the first two periods,” Kasper said. “Just to be able to go out there and do your job and win like this, it's huge for us, I think, moving forward. And obviously we want to get off to better starts, but it's good we can win those games.”

NOTES: Raymond has four goals in his past four games and nine points (four goals, five assists) in a five game point streak. … Red Wings center Dylan Larkin had a four-game point streak (two goals, three assists) and three-game assist streak end. … Van Riemsdyk has 12 points (four goals, eight assists) in his past 10 games. … Hellebuyck played his 600th NHL game. … The Jets had a six-game home point streak end (4-0-2).