Per TSN’s “Statscentre”:
The NHL's hottest team over the last couple of weeks, the @DetroitRedWings have pushed their way back into the East's Wild Card race thanks to 7 consecutive wins. If they beat the Sharks tonight, they'd tie behind just 3 streaks on this list going back to the start of the century pic.twitter.com/aSQApsIYzP
— StatsCentre (@StatsCentre) January 14, 2025
San Jose Sharks coach Ryan Warsofsky was asked to weigh in on the Red Wings’ resurgent play under coach Todd McLellan, and he told the San Jose Mercury News’s Curtis Pashelka that Detroit’s power play stands out:
Since former Sharks head coach Todd McLellan took over as Detroit’s bench boss on Dec. 26, the Red Wings are 7-1-0 and entered Tuesday on a seven-game streak and two points out of a playoff spot. A major reason for the Wings’ success has been their power play, which is 14-for-28 during the team’s streak.
“I just notice how connected they are,” Warsofsky said of Detroit’s power play. “They read off each other extremely well. They’re dangerous off the rush; they’re dangerous off of faceoffs. They have one of the best in Patrick Kane on one flank, that, if you give him time and space, he’ll make a play. If you pressure him, he’ll make a play.”
Daniella Bruce and Ken Kal preview tonight’s game on “The Forecheck”:
Can the @DetroitRedWings make it 🎱 in a row?👀 @KenKalDRW take a look at tonight's matchup with the @SanJoseSharks !! #LGRW pic.twitter.com/ruqp65Zzwi
— Daniella Bruce (@daniellabruce_) January 14, 2025
MLive’s Ansar Khan offers more context regarding Ville Husso’s status as tonight’s starting goaltender against the San Jose Sharks:
“It’s our first opportunity to watch him play, and from what I heard from people around the team, players included, that he played really well when he was here,” coach Todd McLellan said. “He didn’t get a lot of run support, and sometimes good goaltending needs help, and I’m hoping that he can provide that first part and the rest of the crew can help him with everything else.”
This is Husso’s fourth stint in Detroit this season. He was recalled from the Grand Rapids Griffins on Jan. 9 due to Alex Lyon’s upper-body injury. Lyon participated in Tuesday’s morning skate and is getting closer to returning.
This isn’t how Husso or the team pictured it would be after he won the No. 1 job in training camp and the preseason and started the season-opener, but he’s making the best of it.
“I’d love to be in the NHL full-time, but the situation being what it is just going day by day and trying to get good days on top of each other and enjoying it,” Husso said. “It’s been a lot of fun in GR playing games and winning games. Confidence is high. Just try to do my best.”
Husso, 29, is thriving in Grand Rapids (6-1-0, 1.86 goals-against average, .935 save percentage).
“It’s been good playing games there, being around (Sebastian Cossa) and (Jack) Campbell, great guys,” Husso said. “Good goalie coach there, Finnish guy, Roope (Koistinen), working on some stuff with him.”
Continued (paywall)
The Hockey News’s Max Miller discussed tonight’s Wings-Sharks game with Sharks defenseman Jake Walman…
San Jose Sharks defenseman Jake Walman isn’t treating tonight’s game against the Detroit Red Wings any differently.
“No chip on my shoulder. [I’m] just happy to be back here,” Walman said. “[I’m] happy to have a new page to kind of start, and new chapter. I’m just an ultra-competitive person, so every game is a new challenge. It’s just another game, but I’m sure there’ll be a lot more smiles on the ice tonight.”
Walman played 145 games for the Red Wings from 2021-2024. He had 21 goals and 22 assists and was a fan favorite for his competitiveness and iconic Griddy celebration.
…Although the defenseman says he’s treating the game like any other, Sharks head coach Ryan Warsofsky understands the human nature involved.
“Just simplify your game early, [and] not try to do too much and let the game spiral out of control. But at the same time, he’s a human being. He’s not a robot,” Warsofsky said. “There’s emotion that comes with this sport. There’s emotion and feelings that go into playing your former team, living here, growing up here, whatever the it might be, you have to live through those feelings and try to mask them as best as you can, but you can’t cover up everything. So I think the biggest thing for him is keeping his game simple, getting his legs into it, [and] not trying to do too much.”
As did San Jose Hockey Now’s Sheng Peng:
“I’ve always believed that I could be that type of player and kind of grow into that type of player and person, on and off the ice,” Walman said in Detroit today, before the San Jose Sharks take on the Red Wings. “I was given an opportunity in Detroit to play, more so than the year before in St. Louis.”
With the Winged Wheel, Walman started playing about 20 minutes a night and receiving regular power play time.
In particular, Walman thanked ex-teammates David Perron and Moritz Seider for their roles in his development. Detroit signed Walman to a three-year, $10.2 million contract in 2023.
But more than anything, Walman leaned on his roots.
“Goes back to all the adversity early on in the career, just kind of building my way up, and learning to do things the right way. And that’s kind of what I can attest that to,” Walman said. “The people around me the closest, my family and best friends back home know what we’ve gone through. We’re just waiting to put it all together. Given that opportunity, I think that’s the biggest thing.”
The Detroit News’s Ted Kulfan asked Red Wings coach Todd McLellan to weigh in on Lucas Raymond’s talents now that the coach sees #23 on a nightly basis, and here’s what McLellan said:
“From afar we hear about this Raymond kid and see him in the highlights, but do we focus on his development and what he’s done real well to improve and all that stuff? Not really,” McLellan said. “Now that I’m here, you see the tenacity he plays with. He’s got an abrasiveness to him that I wasn’t aware of. He’s got all the skills.”
At that point, McLellan reached back to his past life as an assistant coach with the Wings from 2005-08 and came up with a player that Raymond has similarities with. Now, McLellan was quick to point out Raymond isn’t that player, but simply has similar characteristics.
Yes, Henrik Zetterberg, a Wings’ legend from back in that era and possible Hall of Famer some day.
“For me, he’s got some of, and I’m going to use his name and he’s not that player, but he has a little bit of Zetterberg in him,” McLellan said. “That determination and little bit of abrasiveness, the fire kind of. So, throw in all the other skills and that’s what I see in Lucas.”
The Hockey News’s Carol Schram examines the “coaching bump” that the Red Wings have experienced under coach Todd McLellan:
Five skaters have produced at a point-per-game or better since McLellan took over, and all five have six points or more on the power play.
Patrick Kane and Lucas Raymond lead the way with 13 points each, followed by Dylan Larkin and Alex DeBrincat at 11 and Moritz Seider with eight.
Larkin is also leading all players who have taken more than 100 faceoffs since the Christmas break, with a win rate of 61.2 percent over 134 draws. J.T. Compher is holding his own at 50.4 percent of 121 draws, and Andrew Copp is chipping in at 57.5 percent on 73 draws.
In net, Alex Lyon had been the main man since McLellan’s arrival, with a .931 save percentage and 1.64 goals-against average. But after he suffered an upper-body injury in the first period against the Ottawa Senators a week ago, Cam Talbot has carried the torch admirably.
Lyon is listed as day-to-day. Surely the team would love to have him back before testing its mettle on a tough three-in-four road stretch this weekend — facing the Florida Panthers on Thursday, the Tampa Bay Lightning on Saturday and the Dallas Stars on Sunday.
Continued; Schram goes in-depth here…
The Hockey News’s Sam Stockton reports that Red Wings coach Todd McLellan sees starting Ville Husso this evening against the San Jose Sharks as something of an experiment:
As Detroit looks to continue its winning ways, coach Todd McLellan will be turning to Ville Husso in net for the first time since his takeover. Husso last appeared at the NHL level on Dec. 14, when he beat the Toronto Maple Leafs for his first NHL victory in over a calendar year. Since then, he’s started three times in the AHL for the Grand Rapids Griffins, winning two of those outings including a 31-save shutout his last time out against the Cleveland Monsters on the second of the month.
“It’s our first opportunity to watch him play,” said McLellan of Husso after this morning’s skate. “And from what I’ve heard from people around the team, players included, he played really well when he was here. He didn’t get a lot of run support. Sometimes good goaltending needs help. I’m hoping that he can provide that first part and the rest of the crew can help him with everything else.”
For, McLellan, meanwhile, tonight’s game represents a chance to go up against the team with which he began his head coaching career, having jumped from being a Red Wing assistant to the Sharks head man in the summer of 2008. Of that moment, he said this morning, “You think you’re ready. You’re ready to leave Detroit and go to San Jose, and you carry yourself like you are, but you still have a lot to learn…I think the game has changed a lot since then too, so you have to evolve with it.”
DetroitRedWings.com’s Jonathan Mills sets up tonight’s match-up between the Red Wings and Sharks:
“I think we’re riding a lot of highs and there’s a lot of positivity in our game,” Joe Veleno said. “We just got to keep playing to our strengths, doing what we’re doing and riding this thing right now.”
The Red Wings are coming off a 6-2 victory over the Seattle Kraken on Sunday. Detroit jumped on Seattle early, taking a 4-0 lead before the eight-minute mark of the first period, and never looked back.
“During this stretch, I think we’ve been challenged in a lot of different ways,” Veleno said. “Obviously, being up with the lead and being down against. Last game, being up a lot of goals. I don’t think we’ve been in that situation much this year. There’s been a lot of different challenges that we’ve faced, good and bad. We’re doing a good job with receiving these challenges and responding well to them.”
The Red Wings also went 3-for-5 on the power play against the Kraken, the 11th time this season Detroit has scored multiple man-advantage goals and the eighth game in a row the club has lit the lamp with an extra skater. The Red Wings are now 14-for-28 (50 percent) on the power play under head coach Todd McLellan and, in all, enter Tuesday with the NHL’s second-highest power-play success rate (28.6 percent).
“We’ve gotten really good at retrieving pucks and attacking off of it,” said Lucas Raymond, who leads Detroit with 22 power-play points this season. “Obviously, our shot mentality and just making plays when they’re there. I think that’s a big part. You have to read, react and find the plays.”
The Detroit News’s Mark Falkner reports that former Red Wing Brad Stuart has moved to Michigan to support his sons’ hockey dreams:
It was Game 1 of the 2008 NHL Western Conference semifinals against the arch-rival Colorado Avalanche, and Detroit Red Wings defenseman Brad Stuart asked to skip the game because he had “something more important to attend to.”
Stuart flew to Los Gatos, California, with the blessing of Red Wings general manager Ken Holland, for the birth of his second son, Logan, born on April 23, 2008, the same day as Detroit’s 4-3 win in the opener against the Avalanche at Joe Louis Arena.
Now, 16 years after Detroit swept Colorado and won the franchise’s 11th and last Stanley Cup, Stuart has returned to Michigan from Manhattan Beach, California, to follow his son’s hockey careers with USA Hockey’s National Team Development Program in Plymouth Township.
Logan, 16, is a center with the U17 team and is eligible for the 2026 NHL Draft. Jake, who turned 18 last week, is also a center with the U18 team. He’ll play in Thursday’s All-American Game at USA Hockey Arena for top U.S. prospects for the 2025 NHL Draft (7 p.m., NHL Network).
“At the time, it was a little more acceptable for a guy to miss the birth of a child,” Stuart, 45, said. “Now, it’s expected you’ll be there. The decision wasn’t really that hard for me. I had been there for the birth of Jake, my older boy and I had also missed a game but it didn’t happen in the playoffs. Obviously, I wanted to play, for sure, but I knew these kind of moments are ones you don’t want to miss.”
The Stuart boys played most of their junior hockey with the Los Angeles Junior Kings, coached by their dad, a 6-foot-2, 215-pound defensive defenseman who played 1,056 games with six NHL teams, including five years with the Wings from 2007-2012.
Continued (paywall)
