San Jose 4, Detroit 3: Notes and quotes from Tuesday's game

IN THE FIRST: The Wings owned the puck the first stretch of the game, pounding Antti Niemi with pucks while Jimmy Howard grew cold. That changed at 11:28, when Nicklas Lidstrom's stick caught Logan Couture in the face, sending Lidstrom to the penalty box for high-sticking. He joined Jonathan Ericsson, who began serving 4 minutes for cutting Couture at 9:46. Thus the Sharks had 2 minutes with a two-man advantage, and the Wings had one of their best penalty killers, Lidstrom, in the box. A combination of Brad Stuart, Niklas Kronwall, Henrik Zetterberg, Pavel Datsyuk and Ruslan Salei did an outstanding job blocking lanes and frustrating the Sharks. And when a shot did get through, Howard made big saves, like when he snatched Ryane Clowe's shot out of the air. The Wings got a sound round of applause after that deed, but they couldn't follow up when the Sharks got another power play in the last 20 seconds of the period, allowing Joe Thornton to score his 300th career goal. After the Wings outshot the Sharks, 9-1, to start the game, the Sharks held an 18-10 advantage after 20 minutes.
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