The Detroit Red Wings have almost no room for mediocrity if they want to make the playoffs.

Starting with Tuesday's outing against the Sabres in Buffalo, New York, the Wings have just 18 games left, and 10 of those are on the road. They begin this week on the outside of the playoff picture, because as they have skidded, the New York Islanders have surged past them into the second wild-card berth in the Eastern Conference. Both teams are at 72 points, but the Islanders have a game in hand on the Wings.

The Wings (33-25-6) still have a path to make the playoffs, but losing five straight games has put so much pressure on these last five weeks.

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Last year, the Florida Panthers edged across the playoff-picture finish line with 92 points. The 72 points the Wings have in 64 games extrapolates to 92 points. It may well take somewhere in the ballpark of 95 points to get in this season, however, which would require the Wings to win 11-12 games.

And based on what head coach Derek Lalonde said March 4, they still face at least another week without Dylan Larkin, without whom they are 2-7.

There has been so much talk within the locker room of wanting to play meaningful games this time of year; they don't get much more meaningful than basically needing to play perfect in every one of them in order to survive and thrive in what projects to be a race till the end.

The Wings, Islanders, Tampa Bay Lightning and Washington Capitals entered Monday within a five-point range (with the Capitals and Islanders taking the ice Monday night); that quartet is positioned to most likely compete for the two wild-card spots. The Wings have games remaining against each of the other three: The Islanders in Detroit on March 21, the Capitals in Washington on March 26 and in Detroit on April 9, and the Lightning in Tampa, Florida, on April 1.

This week, though, it's a little easier, with the Sabres on the slate twice (home and away), along with the Arizona Coyotes in Detroit and the Pittsburgh Penguins on the road. If the Wings play like they can (which they didn't last week in Arizona), those are winnable games — all three teams are in the bottom five of their conferences.

If there's anything positive to take from how things have gone so far on this trip, it's the blueprint Lalonde pointed to Saturday night in Las Vegas, when the Wings got two goals because they had someone (Moritz Seider) getting the puck on net and teammates (Michael Rasmussen and J.T. Compher) at the net for deflections.

"It’s a good lesson for our group," Lalonde said. "Here you have Colorado, here you have a team like Vegas, arguably two of the best lineups in the entire league, and they play as simple as can be. They just slice and pound pucks to the net, they get bodies to the net. It’s nothing special. They have a recipe built for success."

It's a lesson the Wings need to apply right away, having all but squandered the leeway they had.

Contact Helene St. James at hstjames@freepress.com. Follow her on Twitter @helenestjames. Her latest book, “On the Clock: Behind the Scenes with the Detroit Red Wings at the NHL Draft,” is available from  Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Triumph Books. Personalized copies available via her e-mail.

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This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Detroit Red Wings left with little leeway to secure playoff spot