Here is what Detroit Red Wings want to remember when they look back at this stretch

The Detroit Red Wings hope that at some point this season they will look back on this stretch as a period of growth. 

Their mental toughness is under scrutiny as they head into Ottawa on a five-game losing skid. Nine games into the season, they  have one excellent game to their credit — at Montreal — and an opening weekend of back-to-back victories. It was after the Oct. 10 victory against the Canadiens that Dylan Larkin had so much excitement in his young voice as he talked about how the Wings were showing an identity of not going away. 

After Tuesday’s 5-2 loss to the Vancouver Canucks at Little Caesars Arena, he sounded frustrated and exasperated. He believes they can play better. But the evidence is scant.

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“We need to come out and play that relentless game,” he said. “We need to play disciplined and play with speed.” 

The Wings played well for the first two periods against the Canucks, just as they played well the third period Oct. 19 at Edmonton. But they are not skilled enough to get away with less than a 60-minute effort. Their power play finally showed signs of life, converting on two of the first three opportunities, but their penalty kill, which started 3-for-3, finished 2-for-5. 

“We played the right way in the first two periods and then it was a special-teams match and they were on top,” Larkin said. 

The Wings were outscored 7-22 during the five-game losing skid. Seven of the goals against have come on the penalty kill. 

“When you give up as many goals as we’ve given up, and enough of it has been on the penalty kill, it crushes you,” coach Jeff Blashill said. “So like in Montreal, they score, we come back and score. The momentum in games is such a huge deal when teams are as close as all these teams are. So when you’re getting scored on as many times as we’ve gotten scored on, it’s hard to keep digging back out. It just is. And we don’t score easy.

"So we have to find a way to either get more scoring — I think Lark’s line has done a really good job, but we need more scoring throughout the lineup. Or two, we have to do a better job of giving up less goals. In the two Vancouver games, that comes down to (the) penalty kill.”

Of the 21 goals the Wings scored their first nine games, Anthony Mantha accounted for seven and linemate Tyler Bertuzzi had three. One of the reasons the Wings put Evgeny Svechnikov in Tuesday’s lineup was in the hopes he could help make them look a little more threatening offensively.

But if that doesn't happen, they need to be better defensively. The goaltending has been there — Tuesday’s loss wasn’t on Jimmy Howard, nor the Edmonton loss on Jonathan Bernier — but the skaters haven't.

“We know we can be a good team,” Justin Abdelkader said. “We can’t let it unravel like that in the third period. The power play was good, got us a couple kills. The penalty kill, we have to keep up our end. 

“That Montreal game, we played fast, we were above guys, had a lot of chances.”

The Wings had rough patches last season and the one before. They talked in the first week of having the maturity to close out games. Now they need the maturity not to let this stretch derail them. 

“We better have mental toughness,” Blashill said. “In the end, the season, it feels like a sprint at times but it’s really a marathon. That doesn’t mean you lack urgency, that’s not the case. But you have to understand there’s going to be some tough moments, and I hope at the end of the year we’re talking about how we grew from this moment.”

Contact Helene St. James at hstjames@freepress.com. Follow her on Twitter @helenestjames. Read more on the Detroit Red Wings and sign up for our Red Wings newsletter.