Red Wings coach Derek Lalonde gave an interview to 97.1 the Ticket’s “Costa and Jansen” on Monday morning, and he had this to say about Nate Danielson, Marco Kasper and Carter Mazur, per 97.1 the Ticket’s Kyle Beery:
As last year’s youngsters have some much-needed experience under their belts, Lalonde says there’s a new crop of young players ready to make “big jumps.”
“I gotta be careful because I gotta let this play out. But I’m a very huge fan of those three players knocking on the door,” Lalonde said. “Three guys that’s knocking on the door are Nate Danielson, Carter Mazur and Marco Kasper. And I just love a lot of the two-way game they have. I know as a coach, it was a great team, a fun team to coach last year, but we outscored a lot of our defensive deficiencies.”
“But some of their DNA is to lean, score offense. It’s who they are. All three of those guys, I think they have that two-way, hard-to-play-against DNA. I just get really excited about watching them,” Lalonde said.
As free agency began on July 1, Lalonde said he and GM Steve Yzerman knew they needed and wanted more of that “two way type of guy.” But he said it was very hard for Yzerman to “go out and overpay and do these extra terms,” Lalonde said, noting one unnamed free agent who fit that bill was driving a very hard bargain.
“It was just out of control that day. And in my mind we may have that, that DNA in those three guys coming up, it’s just a matter of when they’ll be ready.”