DETROIT >> The ineffectiveness on the power play Thursday hurt the Red Wings.

When a team gets five power plays in the first period and doesn’t capitalize, no goals whatsoever, ultimately losing the game 4-3, as the Wings did to Ottawa, the outcome isn’t shocking.

But an equally troubling night on the defensive end also didn’t help the Wings.

Now, they made a spirited and entertaining comeback in the third period, nearly swiping at least one important point in the standings. But the comeback came up short, and the Wings remained stuck in the standings, just outside of the cutoff line.

Afterward, coach Todd McLellan and Wings players felt good about the third period. The Wings certainly showed resilience and fight. But it’s all the issues that led them to play from behind and need that comeback that made the game tough to stomach.

McLellan and the players have used the term “not good enough” often the last little while after losses. McLellan clarified after the loss what isn’t “good enough.”

“We play hard, we commit, we do all that type of stuff, but that’s not good enough,” McLellan said. “We have to get better defensively. We’ve got to get better in the faceoff circle. We have to have better coverages.

“I look at the game (Thursday), 4-3, wow, you almost came back. You made it close. But that may be the most outnumbered-rush situations I’ve seen this year from our team. The first goal was four-on-two. There was real, multiple two-on-ones. There were short breakaways where the (Wings’ defense) was just getting walked from the tops of the circles in way too much.

“Until we learn to take that crap out of our game, we’re going to need six (goals) a night, and that can’t happen. So that’s not good enough. When you use those words, sometimes people think effort or whatever. No, it’s systematic. It’s the mind. It’s understanding the game that’s not good enough.”

The Wings, somehow, remain in the thick of this middling Eastern Conference wild-card chase despite having lost 11 of their last 14 games. The schedule, and the lack of success, has been a grind. Too often, the Wings have sagged for parts in games which have ultimately cost them.

“I go back to when we arrived,” said McLellan, of when he was hired with his assistant Trent Yawney on Dec. 26. “We talked about building up a belief system, and it’s getting tested. It has been getting tested this whole month.

“It’s not just the wins and losses in your record, it’s about what happens in a game. We’ve seen that multiple times where it doesn’t go our way, and it drops off for five minutes and then we get it back. It’s as much mental as it is physical and structural.”

Time is running out. The Wings realize that. There are only 10 games left in the regular season. After Thursday’s frustrating loss, and not being able to take advantage of teams losing around them, forward Lucas Raymond talked about the importance of getting on a win streak.

“It feels like a little bit of a repeated record talking about where we want to go,” Raymond said. “Now it’s just about time to show up. It’s about getting it done. You can say however many times you want that we’re going to do everything in our power to get there but for us right now, it’s just about digging in and getting it done and keeping that belief in ourselves.”