Month: July 2026

Red Wings release their 2026-2027 regular season theme game and promotional schedule (a little belatedly)

A day after WXYZ and the Detroit Free Press gleaned the Red Wings’ 2026-2027 regular season theme game and promotional schedule, the Red Wings themselves posted the sked on DetroitRedWings.com:

Detroit Red Wings announce 2026-27 theme games and promotional schedule

DETROIT – The Detroit Red Wings have unveiled Hockeytown 101, the team’s 2026-27 season campaign, with the announcement of the regular season schedule on July 16, followed by the announcement of the Red Wings’ theme games and promotional schedule.

2026-27 single-game tickets go on sale Tuesday, Aug. 4 at DetroitRedWings.com/Tickets. Fans can sign up for the priority presale list today for exclusive access to purchase tickets before the public by visiting the 2026-27 Priority Presale page.

The Hockeytown 101 promotional schedule features several exciting door giveaways, including a bobblehead series commemorating the 25th anniversary of the Red Wings’ 2002 Stanley Cup championship, as well as Salt & Pepper Shakers for the annual Thanksgiving Eve game and more.

The promo schedule also features themed ticket packages which come with a limited-edition item, including a “Build-Your-Own-Fit” series, Heritage Game shirseys, College Game hats and many more.

DOOR GIVEAWAYS (LIMITED QUANTITIES AVAILABLE): 

Oct. 4 vs. Winnipeg – Sergei Fedorov Bobblehead Giveaway (Presented by Little Caesars)

Oct. 29 vs. Chicago – Nicklas Lidstrom Bobblehead Giveaway (Presented by Henry Ford Health)

Nov. 5 vs. Vegas – Military Appreciation Night Hat Giveaway (Presented by Chevrolet) 

Nov. 18 vs. Boston – Scotty Bowman Bobblehead Giveaway (Presented by Meijer)

Nov. 25 vs. Vancouver – Thanksgiving Salt & Pepper Shakers Giveaway (Presented by Meijer) 

Jan. 23 vs. Tampa Bay – Moritz Seider Stein Giveaway (Presented by Fifth Third Bank) 

THEME GAMES and SPECIAL TICKET OFFERS: 

Continue reading Red Wings release their 2026-2027 regular season theme game and promotional schedule (a little belatedly)

WJSS Tweet of note: Plante, Hurlbert remain on Team USA’s combined roster

The World Junior Summer Showcase in Windsor, Ontario has moved into its second phase for Team USA, which cuts down its two USA Blue and USA White rosters into 1 team for the second half of the schedule.

Per NHL.com’s Mike G. Morreale, Red Wings prospects Victor Plante and JP Hulrbert remain part of the Americans’ combined roster, but Brent Solomon is not listed on today’s forward lineup:

Update: Hurlbert is also wearing #2 for Michigan this fall:

Tweet of note: Michigan Sports Hall of Fame to induct Red Wings color commentator Paul Woods

Per the Detroit Red Wings:

Update: From Detroit SportsNet:

Khan assesses whether the Red Wings’ waiver-exempt prospects will make the roster out of camp

Red Wings beat writer Ansar Khan examines whether Detroit’s waiver-exempt players might make the team coming out of this fall’s training camp:

Michael Brandsegg-Nygard

He wasn’t ready for the NHL last season but should be this year after a strong season in Grand Rapids (20 goals, 44 points in 60 games). He stepped up in the AHL playoffs (four goals, eight points in eight playoff games). He joined Norway midway through the World Championship and helped the nation win its first medal by beating Canada for the bronze (three goals, three assists in five games). The No. 15 pick in 2024 plays a heavy game and should fit in on the Red Wings’ third line.

Michal Postava

After a strong regular season (17-6-0, 1.79 goals-against average, .937 save percentage) as Sebastian Cossa’s backup, this AHL rookie took over the reins in the postseason and acquitted himself well (4-4, 2.09 GAA, .912 save percentage). He’ll start as the No. 1 in Grand Rapids after Detroit signed veteran Daniil Tarasov to back-up John Gibson. But the Red Wings would feel comfortable with Postava as their No. 2 if needed.

Nate Danielson

The Red Wings’ lack of depth at center, depending on how Dylan Larkin’s situation is resolved, could create an opportunity for Danielson in the bottom six. He might have been the fourth rookie to make Detroit’s season-opening roster last season if not for an injury in training camp. But, like Brandsegg-Nygard, Danielson (ninth overall pick in 2023) wasn’t NHL-ready (two goals, seven points in 28 games with the Red Wings). He was sent back to the Griffins where an injury ended his season on Feb. 18.

Continued; Khan believes that Axel Sandin Pellikka and Carter Bear will need more time in Grand Rapids for professional seasoning.

Red Wings prospect JP Hulrbert: Allen, Texas’s ‘Michigan Man’

Red Wings prospect and incoming University of Michigan freshman JP Hulrbert is taking part in the World Junior Summer Showcase in Windsor this week. He’s from Allen, Texas, but his father and grandfather are from Michigan, and, as such, the American forward told SI.com’s Jennifer Streeter that being drafted by his “hometown team“–by extension–means he world to him:

“The Red Wings were how I got into hockey. I think my very first jersey was a Red Wings jersey,” J.P. said in an exclusive. “Once I got drafted by them, it was kind of like a dream come true. The little kid in me would just be through the roof; I am so excited to be a part of Detroit.”

Known for his competitive nature, J.P. spent a lot of time developing his shot and offensive production over the years.

That development clearly paid off, leading him to take to the stage at KeyBank Center in Buffalo, N.Y., on June 26 at the aforementioned draft. However, his down time was often spent with his family in Michigan.

“Ever since he was little, we would typically go up for an extended period of time. He would love to go fishing and tubing and all the fun Michigan lake activities. We’ve got the majority of my family on his paternal side up in Michigan, so I’ve probably got 15 cousins up there,” Jeffrey Paul Hurlbert II also said.

J.P. would spend his time growing up split between Texas and Michigan. The former member of the Dallas Stars Elite and WHL First All-Star Team selection was recently announced on July 23 as one of the seven incoming players who will make up Head Coach Brandon Naurato’s freshman class for the Wolverines’ 2026-27 season.

In addition to J.P. having a clear love for [the University of] Michigan, the Wolverines love him right back.

“What drove me to J.P. is his passion for the game. He’s a student of the game, people that want to be the best versions of themselves — but don’t just talk about it like they put in the work. That’s what really drove me to him,” Naurato said of J.P. “He’s a game breaker, an elite offensive talent playmaker, an elite scorer, and he’s proven that at the junior level. We’re excited to put him in a position to perform to his strengths.”

Two things: the Dylan Larkin deal hasn’t happened…somehow?…and the Red Wings’ contractual efficiency is not spectacular. Shocking.

Of annoying Red Wings-related note this morning…

  1. Bleacher Report’s Joe Yerdon examines 7 transactions that “Should Have Happened” this offseason, including the resolution to Dylan Larkin’s desire to leave the Red Wings:

Dylan Larkin to the Minnesota Wild

All while Dylan Larkin remains with the Detroit Red Wings, we’ll be wondering “what if” about how things played out this summer.

Larkin’s trade request to now-former GM Steve Yzerman rocked the organization. It was a sudden move from the team captain and one that perhaps helped usher in a change in the hierarchy in Detroit.

Although Yzerman is still with the organization in a new role, his successor will have Larkin’s trade request front and center on their desk when they’re hired.

Of the four teams Larkin reportedly wants to go to, Minnesota is the one that could use him most and has the assets to make a deal happen most readily.

Adding him to the Wild roster to play alongside Matt Boldy, Kirill Kaprizov and Quinn Hughes would make Minnesota much more dangerous. The kind of trade package the Wild could put together would also give the Red Wings a lot to work with both for now and the future.

This trade, or any move for Larkin, still could happen, but we’re left wondering why it hasn’t.

Continued; the trade hasn’t happened, despite the Wild press’s insistence to the contrary, because the Wild haven’t offered Detroit enough present-day help to consummate the trade.

This is an aggravating exercise. We know why these trades haven’t happened–because you can’t wish your way into a transaction happening!

2. And, while I’m in a mood, The Athletic’s Dom Luszczyszyn is here to pee on our Cornflakes with a statistical analysis of…*checks notes*…”contract efficiencies” of NHL teams…and you will be shocked to find out that the Red Wings, who employ Andrew Copp, J.T. Compher and other players with bloated contracts, rank 16th out of 32nd in the league in Luszczyszyn’s rankings:

16. Detroit Red Wings

Last season: 13th

Shoutout to the Lucas Raymond and Moritz Seider deals; they’re the only reason the Red Wings barely land in the league’s top half. A lot of the cap sheet aside from that duo still looks lackluster, however, and it’s why the Red Wings’ average positive value rate is on the wrong side of 50 percent.

The Red Wings have a lot of cap space, but it’s rare that they know how to use it. A lot of their free agency bets from the past have aged poorly and I don’t quite see why they traded for Keegan Kolesar, given his contract. The Ben Chiarot extension from earlier this season remains mind-boggling and was immediately one of the league’s worst deals. That his game only degraded further from that moment makes things even worse.

Continued; somehow, Luszczyszyn’s model ranks Keegan Kolesar and Daniil Tarasov’s contracts as particularly egregious, though I do not understand how $4.5 million total for a fourth-liner ($2.5 million for Kolesar) and a back-up goaltender ($2 million for Tarasov) earn “C-” and “C+” grades, respectively.

Feet don’t fail me

When the Red Wings announced that they’d re-signed AHL/ECHL goaltender Carter Gylander on Tuesday night, the impatient fan base largely erupted as if the apocalypse was nigh.

Because it wasn’t Simon Edvinsson, the Red Wings’ only other restricted free agent, who’d been inked to a new deal, the news was a clear indication that Steve Yzerman won’t be let near anything or anyone important, fans suggested.

More of the same, they said, more of the same after another day of no data, no news as to whether a team hurtling through the 2026 offseason might have any impetus whatsoever to pick up its process in terms of hiring the next GM, the next president of hockey operations–however the Wings choose to stack their hockey operations pyramid–there’s no doubt that, even in late July, fans can hear the drumming heartbeat of training camp a month and-a-half away, the start of the 2026-2027 season in late September, and the natives are more than restless as the team appears to listlessly drift along a current drifting faster and faster toward a season of unknowns.

I would argue the opposite: to me, the fact that the Wings are slowly but surely getting business done on the hockey operations side, as slowly and laboriously as things might appear, is a much better sign than nothing at all.

Where was I concerned about the status of the listing S.S. Detroit Red Wings on Tuesday?

Continue reading Feet don’t fail me

Press release: Red Wings re-sign Carter Gylander to 1-year, 2-way contract

Per the Detroit Red Wings:

RED WINGS RE-SIGN CARTER GYLANDER TO ONE-YEAR, TWO-WAY CONTRACT

  … Goaltender Split 2025-26 Season Between Grand Rapids and Toledo …

DETROIT – The Detroit Red Wings today re-signed goaltender Carter Gylander to a one-year, two-way contract.

Gylander, 25, spent the majority of the 2025-26 season with the ECHL’s Toledo Walleye, posting a 20-9-5 record with a 2.78 goals-against average, a 0.901 save percentage and two shutouts in 34 regular-season appearances. The 6-foot-5, 197-pound netminder also logged a 6-4 record with a 2.80 goals-against average and an 0.899 save percentage in 10 Kelly Cup Playoff starts. Additionally, Gylander showed a 7-0-1 record with a 1.62 goals-against average, a 0.942 save percentage and one shutout in eight games with the American Hockey League’s Grand Rapids Griffins in 2025-26. Selected by the Red Wings in the seventh round (191st overall) of the 2019 NHL Entry Draft, Gylander has compiled a 40-18-10 record with a 2.70 goals-against average, a 0.904 save percentage and four shutouts in 68 games with the Walleye. Gylander has also tallied a 9-1-1 record with a 2.15 goals-against average, a 0.926 save percentage and one shutout in 11 games with the Griffins.

Prior to turning professional, Gylander played four seasons at Colgate University from 2020-24, posting a 46-46-13 record with a 2.69 goals-against average, a 0.907 save percentage and five shutouts in 106 appearances. Gylander helped the Raiders clinch a berth in the NCAA Tournament as a junior, logging a 19-15-5 record with a 2.46 goals-against average, a 0.914 save percentage and two shutouts in 39 contests. He was named the 2023 ECAC Tournament’s Most Outstanding Player after backstopping Colgate to its first conference tournament championship since 1990. The Beaumont, Alta., native spent parts of three seasons with the Sherwood Park Crusaders of the Alberta Junior Hockey League from 2017-20, where he compiled a 51-9-0 record with a 2.23 goals-against average, a 0.919 save percentage and six shutouts in 64 games. Gylander earned Top Goaltender honors in 2019-20 after posting a 34-5-0 record with a 2.07 goals-against average, a 0.924 save percentage and three shutouts in 40 games with the Crusaders. On the international stage, Gylander made two appearances with Canada West at the 2019 World Junior A Challenge.

Allen: The Red Wings’ front office information blackout isn’t helping things

Since Red Wings GM Steve Yzerman unofficially stepped down from his position in order for the organization to find a new general manager, we haven’t heard a peep from the Red Wings’ front office–somewhat predictably, given how Detroit’s sports teams work–and Detroit Hockey Now’s Kevin Allen finds the information blackout to be problematic:

Fans have concerns because they can’t feel, or sense, the urgency in hiring a new general manager. It’s been 13 days since Yzerman met with Chris Ilitch and left without his GM title.

Oddly, we have not heard the usual search chatter about teams granting permission to interview, people pulling out of consideration, those who have interviewed and those coming back for a second interview.

….

Neither Ilitch (nor Yzerman) has spoken with the media to explain why Yzerman was out after he was in charge of the draft and free agent signings. We don’t know what kind of general manager that Ilitch wants to hire. Does he want a big name like his late father always did? Does he want a younger GM with a more modern approach? The Detroit Tigers are stressing analytics with their hires. Is that going to happen with the Red Wings?

But what the fans want to know most is the timeline for the search. They want to see the new person in place with the time to make an impact before training camp, if that is even possible?

The Red Wings have a right to conduct business as they see fit. But this is a business dependent upon the loyalty of fans. You would think that someone in the chain of command would explain how long they anticipate the search will take and whether the Red Wings are really open for business while this is going on. It should be priority to free your fan base from worry.

Continued; the Red Wings never operated with much accountability toward their fan base during the Yzerman regime, and the fact that the information blackout continues seems to indicate that nothing is going to change any time soon in terms of holding the team accountable to its paying customers.

Daily Faceoff deems the Red Wings the ‘most mediocre team’ of the past 10 campaigns

Daily Faceoff argues that the Red Wings have been the “most mediocre team” of the past 10 seasons, with DFO’s Scott Maxwell suggesting the following:

Detroit Red Wings

Playoff appearances: 0
Playoff series wins: 0
Top-five draft picks: 1 (Lucas Raymond, 2020)
100-point seasons: 0
Points percentage: .470 (30th)

Was there any doubt the Red Wings would top this list? They’re the only team not to make the playoffs at all in the last 10 years, resulting in zero regular season success. But then they’ve also struggled to truly tank and acquire game-breaking talent. While they have the second-most top 10 picks in the last 10 years, they only drafted into the top five once. To be fair, the lottery screwed them over frequently (nine teams below them in the lottery moved up during their 10-year drought, and they were pushed out of the top five twice) and the one player they did get in the top five is very good (Raymond). But most of Detroit’s run of mediocrity came from their own doing.

For starters, they struggled in the draft, especially with some of their top picks. While they did get talents like Moritz Seider and Simon Edvinsson, they also blew top picks on Michael Rasmussen and Filip Zadina early on in the rebuild, and the jury is still out on Marco Kasper, Nate Danielson, Michael Brandsegg-Nygard and Carter Bear. On top of that, now-former general manager Steve Yzerman jumped the gun and spent a ton of money in free agency on middling players like Ben Chiarot, J.T. Compher, Andrew Copp and Justin Holl, giving the team a higher floor than they needed at the time, but not a high enough ceiling to make the playoffs. As a result, they are still stuck in the murky middle and struggling to make the playoffs. Now that captain Dylan Larkin wants out, Detroit looks poised for several more miserable years.

Continued; there’s no doubt that the “Jump the Gun” offseason arguably set the rebuild back, but I have to believe that there’s going to be urgency for the next administration to end the “misery” ASAP. This team has a solid talent base and it has a fan base that’s spending a lot of money to watch mediocrity. Those factors do not mix.