The Red Wings’ 4-2 victory over the Toronto Maple Leafs on Saturday was particularly pivotal for the team itself, and the Wings of course hope that they will begin to turn around their 12-14-and-2 record starting on Wednesday when they host the Philadelphia Flyers, embarking upon a 4-games-in-6-nights stretch.
The difference in tone between what the Wings’ writers have to say and the national press believes about the team is starkly different, however.
This morning, the Free Press’s Helene St. James discussed Ville Husso’s first win of the season in optimistic tones…
The Wings (12-14-4) don’t play again until Wednesday when they host the Philadelphia Flyers, doing so buoyed by having just beaten the Toronto Maple Leafs. That was aided by goalie Ville Husso winning his first NHL game in more than a year, and the Wings playing one of their more complete games of the season.
“It was a huge win,” coach Derek Lalonde said after Saturday’s 4-2 victory. “You’re trying to get some traction any way you can. That’s two out of three now. It’s a win against a good team that had their A game. So I give our guys a ton of credit. Just glad we flipped one here.”
There may have been no Wings player happier than Husso, who emerged to chat with reporters wearing a seasonally appropriate Wings hat, its white brim and red fabric, adorned with a white pom-pom, calling to mind someone reputed to reside even further north than Husso’s native Finland. It is Husso’s homeland that has given him strength over the past year, made challenging by injuries and struggles that landed him on waivers and in the minors. To that end, he relied on the stoic perseverance bred into Finns.
“It’s been kind of a tough go there,” Husso said. “Last year, injuries, and this year, no wins. Just keep grinding. It’s called sisu, actually — they teach us at a young age in Finland — trust yourself and do your job. It’s not always easy, but it was nice to get the win for sure.”
The national media, on the other hand, believes that the Red Wings absolutely suck. Whether it’s the Toronto Sun’s Steve Simmons whining that “nobody wants to go near Detroit” yesterday or the Hockey News’ Adam Proteau absolutely, positively must trade everyone and clear the decks via “seller’s” trades in order to tank, tank and tank some more…
And The Athletic’s Sean McIndoe has some negative words to say about the Red Wings as well this morning, arguing that the Wings are truly awful, and that Steve Yzerman should be fired over that:
Thirty games in, this team can’t manage much of anything at five-on-five, the penalty kill is terrible and they’re largely a one-line team. Cam Talbot had been solid in goal, but he’s hurt. Veterans like Patrick Kane and Vladimir Tarasenko aren’t scoring. And while the younger players are producing, their success hasn’t moved the needle much because there just isn’t enough blue-chip talent coming into the system.
It all leads back to Steve Yzerman and his rebuilding plan, which has somehow been both too aggressive (when it comes to UFA spending on veteran depth) and too patient (when it comes to shaking up a core that just isn’t good enough). I’ll be honest, I’m hesitant to write about the Red Wings much these days, because it feels like we’ve all been recycling the same basic takes for years now. The ceiling isn’t high enough, they don’t have an elite player to build around and the reinforcements Yzerman keeps bringing in are too old, too expensive or both. Then Red Wings fans ask what he should have done instead, and everyone just kind of mumbles about lottery luck.
That’s why this week’s matchup with the Sabres felt meaningful, and not just because it meant one of these two teams would have to snap a losing streak. With the Senators showing signs of life, the Wings and Sabres are basically tied at the hip as the two Atlantic pretenders stuck in neutral, entering the weekend with identical records. When Harman and Murat put together their panic rankings, the Sabres were at 9.5 out of 10, with only one team ranked even worse. I bet you can guess which one.
So it was bad. But then you get a game like Saturday night, when the plan comes together and the Wings beat a good Toronto team. Ville Husso is sharp, they get a big goal from Moritz Seider, and even one of those maligned veterans pays off as Jeff Petry scores. The Wings look like a playoff team again. Right up until the next game rolls around, and they don’t.
Continued (paywall); the Red Wings sure laid an egg vs. Philadelphia last Thursday, and I don’t know anyone who isn’t incredibly frustrated by the team’s inconsistency.
All of that being said, even though the team doesn’t appear to have meaningfully replaced David Perron’s vocal leadership or Shayne Gostisbehere’s point production as of yet, there is nothing wrong with hoping that the Wings utilize the remainder of December to slowly but surely turn the team around.
By the time the team hits game #37 on New Year’s Eve vs. Pittsburgh, there’s definitely a sense that either the team is going to need changes both behind and on the players’ bench in order to reset and make a second-half push…
But this “fire everyone, fire Yzerman” logic just isn’t holding up, in no small part because as long as Mrs. Ilitch is alive, never mind as long as Chris Ilitch is around, Steve Yzerman is the Red Wings’ GM, and that’s the way it is, for better or worse.
Yes, the Red Wings’ 2024-2025 season has been disappointing and infuriatingly inconsistent at times. But the team is not dead on arrival yet, and ultimately, it’s going to be up to Derek Lalonde’s coaching staff and the rest of the current roster to “find traction” and get its shit together over the remainder of December and over the course of the pre-Four Nations Cup break in February.
There is no wrong way “to fan,” and you have every reason to believe that the Red Wings are a lost cause already, but I’m not there yet.
