• Preview
• Recap
• Bleachers

Schneider records second career hat trick in Red Wings' rout

Oct 12, 2006 - 2:44 AM DETROIT (Ticker) -- Defenseman Mathieu Schneider had another memorable moment on the ice.

Schneider recorded his second career hat trick and Henrik Zetterberg added a goal and an assist as the Detroit Red Wings cruised to a 9-2 victory over the Phoenix Coyotes, who have lost three straight games.

Mikael Samuelsson scored twice and Nicklas Lidstrom had three assists for the Red Wings, who went 2-for-4 on the power play. Detroit entered the contest 0-for-11 with the man advantage.

With the score knotted at 1-1 in the first period, Schneider deflected a backhanded shot off goaltender Curtis Joseph's skate 13:48 into the session. Schneider tallied again 4:10 into the second period for a two-goal cushion.

"He (Schneider) can shoot the puck," coach Mike Babcock said. "He scored on a couple of seeing-eye shots tonight. He's a big help on the power play. Nick (Lidstrom) slides the puck to him and he finds the net with it."

"For him (Schneider) to get one (hat trick) here at home is very nice," Jason Williams said. "When he shoots the puck he gets rid of it really quick and I think that it's good for him to get a good start and help us out offensively."

After Williams added to lead with a power-play tally in the second, Schneider found the net again with 4:31 to go in the second.

"I got lucky on the early one (goal)," Schneider said. "On the other two, he (Joseph) didn't have much chance. He was screened."

"For him (Schneider) to get one (hat trick) here at home is very nice," Jason Williams said. "When he shoots the puck he gets rid of it really quick and I think that it's good for him to get a good start and help us out offensively." Zetterberg's goal 5:26 into the contest, snapped the Red Wings' season-opening struggles on the power play.

"As a team we just talked about throwing the puck at the net, especially on the power play," Schneider said.

Dominik Hasek made 19 saves for Detroit.

Joseph turned away 22 shots prior to being replaced by Mike Morrison.

"It wasn't much fun out there, there's no question about that," Phoenix coach Wayne Gretzky said. "They basically embarrassed us as a team. I don't think that our team can get much lower than this. They just dominated us in every aspect of the game and they decisively beat us.

"It's not going to do much good ranting and raving and yelling and screaming tonight." We've got to get back to basics here. By basics I mean we can't even pass the puck five feet right now. We just need to straighten all that out and go back to square one."