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Williams scores twice as Red Wings topple Blackhawks

Jan 14, 2007 - 5:36 AM DETROIT (Ticker) -- When Jason Williams and the Detroit Red Wings see the Chicago Blackhawks on their schedule, a good feeling comes over them.

Williams scored twice on the power play and Tomas Holmstrom tallied for the eighth time in as many games as the Red Wings posted a 6-3 victory over the Blackhawks.

Robert Lang had a goal and an assist and defenseman Danny Markov and Kris Draper also tallied for the Red Wings, who have won 11 of their last 12 meetings with the Blackhawks.

Holmstrom tied the game at 1-1 when he received a cross-ice pass from Henrik Zetterberg and fired a wrist shot that beat goaltender Nikolai Khabibulin to the stick side with 4:01 left in the first period.

"We didn't play really good to start with," Holmstrom said. "We had to get our legs going. It's always good when you have lots of shots and you get traffic in front of the net. That's what we had tonight."

Williams put Detroit ahead seven minutes into the second session, backhanding the puck between the pads of the netminder Khabibulin from the doorstep.

Lang made it 3-1 just 1:42 afterward and, after Craig MacDonald halved Chicago's deficit later in the period, Williams completed his second two-goal game of the season with a shot from the right point with 6:23 remaining in the third.

"It feels nice," Williams said. "I didn't do anything special out there, just played my game. I just sort of saw the puck a little better. The puck was sort of following me around. More important was the two points."

Williams' second tally was Detroit's sixth on the power play in its last two games.

Zetterberg, captain Niklas Lidstrom and Pavel Datsyuk each had two assists for the Red Wings, who improved to 15-3-3 at home. Earlier in the day, Zetterberg was selected as an All-Star reserve for the Western Conference.

Chris Osgood stopped 33 shots for Detroit, which has yielded just three goals in its last 25 shorthanded situations.

"It was great for Ozzy to get us the win," Red Wings coach Mike Babcock said. "I think he made some key saves down the stretch."

Defenseman Brent Seabrook and Tony Salmelainen scored and Khabibulin made 26 saves for Chicago, which has lost five straight games and seven of eight.

Khabibulin has lost his last five games, surrendering 17 goals in that span.

The Blackhawks also failed on all six of their power-play attempts, which did not please coach Denis Savard.

"We lost the game because we didn't score any power-play goals," he said. "At the same time, you can't allow the goals that we did defensively. You have to play every aspect, and when you're on your own program, it's not going to work."