Toledo Walleye ink D Sean Farrell to 1-year contract

The Toledo Walleye have inked defenseman Thomas Farrell to a 1-year contract:

Here’s the Walleye’s press release:

(Toledo, OH) â€“ Defenseman Thomas Farrell has agreed to terms with the Toledo Walleye for the 2023-2024 season.

Farrell made his pro debut with the Walleye during the 2022-2023 season, appearing in four games starting on March 8 at Wheeling. The Lake Bluff, Illinois native scored his first pro goal in his second contest, March 10 at Kalamazoo. He finished with a goal and assist in his four contests with Toledo, while logging a plus three rating.

The 24-year-old played his college hockey at Army, appearing in 126 games over four years. He finished with 62 total points (16G, 46A) over his college career, while serving as team captain in the 2022-2023 season. Farrell posted career-bests in goals (6) and assists (14) in his senior season and was honored during the 2020-2021 by being named to the AHA First Team.

Reviewing Andrew Copp’s 22-23 season

DetroitRedWings.com’s Jonathan Mills looks back at Andrew Copp’s 2022-2023 season this morning:

While his Detroit Red Wings teammates prepared for the 2022-23 season throughout training camp and the preseason, Andrew Copp was rehabbing from offseason abdominal surgery.

Copp did recover to make his Red Wings debut on Opening Night, but the 29-year-old forward admitted he was not his normal self at the start of his first campaign in Detroit.

“Especially in the beginning of the season, I don’t think I was playing my best,” Copp said in his end-of-season media session. “I got very pass happy. Kind of related to the injury, not being able to drive and skate with the puck as well as I would have liked.”

But Copp got healthier as the season progressed and finished with 42 points, including a career-high 33 assists, and was one of only three Red Wings skaters to play all 82 games.

“As the year went on, I thought he had a bigger impact,” Red Wings Executive Vice President and General Manager Steve Yzerman said. “He was very good on our penalty kill. He’s a very good defensive player. He was one of our plus players and played a lot of hard minutes.”

Continued; Copp will definitely be a better player after a year’s worth of recovery from his core muscle surgery, as well as a year’s worth of acclimation to the Red Wings’ systems of play.

DHN’s Allen examines three statistical metrics for Red Wings improvement

Detroit Hockey Now’s Kevin Allen suggests that the Red Wings need to improve in three specific statistical categories in an attempt to make the playoffs during the 2023-2024 season. Here’s one of those statistical categories:

271 Goals Scored: The Red Wings only netted 237 goals last season. That means the team needs to increase goal production by 14.3%. Even with the addition of Alex DeBrincat and JT Compher, that’s a big ask. The Red Wings added Daniel Sprong, coming off a 21-goal season. But they moved out Dominik Kubalik’s 20 goals.

The key, as Yzerman has pointed out, will be increased production from everyone on the roster. Can Lucas Raymond go from 17 to 25 goals? It feels like he can. Certainly, Andrew Copp will improve on his nine-goal production. At worst, he should score 15-plus goals. That’s also true for Michael Rasmussen who has made himself valuable by becoming a better all-around player. But more goals are expected.

Younger players like Joe Veleno and Jonatan Berggren can do more. There’s no reason why Berggren can’t go from 15 to 20, given enough ice time.

The 271 goal standard is important. Eleven of the 12 teams that reached that number made the playoffs last season. The Vegas Golden Knights (267) and Carolina Hurricanes (262) also made the playoffs after falling just short of 271.

Continued (paywall)

Tweet of note: Five Red Wings to take part in the ‘All in 4 ALS’ game in Windsor on August 12th

Per the Detroit Red Wings:

Talking Datsyuk’s HHOF candidacy

The Athletic’s Eric Duhatschek answered reader questions in a mailbag feature today, and his answer as to whether Pavel Datsyuk is a Hockey Hall of Fame player is…weird:

How do you think the Hockey Hall of Fame selection committee will handle Pavel Datsyuk next year in his first year of eligibility with the controversy around Russian players? With Mogilny, he’s been left out for so long it’s more of the same, but Datsyuk was generally thought to be a first-ballot lock. —Rory S.

I haven’t served on the selection committee for five years now, so I have no idea what the discussion was like this year when it came to a pair of Russian-born players, Alex Mogilny and/or Sergei Gonchar, who were thought to have reasonably good chances of making the grade in 2023 and didn’t. Was there a tacit fear that electing Russian players amid the war in Ukraine would reflect badly on the Hall? Hard to know. Selection committee chairman Mike Gartner, when interviewed on TSN after the selections were announced, carefully sidestepped a question about snubs or players who didn’t make the cut by saying that just because someone isn’t elected to the Hall of Fame one year doesn’t mean they won’t eventually become a Hall of Famer. Was that just a generic boilerplate observation, or can we read into that, that they were careful treading around Russian players? As for Datsyuk’s candidacy, he won four Lady Byngs, three Selkes, two Stanley Cups, appeared in five Olympics on behalf of Russia and scored 918 points in 951 NHL games. That’s a Hall of Fame resume. The debate or discussion will be: Is he a first-ballot choice or not? A few others who seemed like easy first-ballot choices – Joe Nieuwendyk and Dale Hawerchuk, for example – weren’t elected until their second years of eligibility. So there is a precedent to maybe push back Datsyuk a year.

Continued; yeah, war in Russia or no war in Russia, I don’t understand why you’d “push back Datsyuk.”

Khan profiles Sebastian Cossa

MLive’s Ansar Khan profiles Red Wings goaltending prospect Sebastian Cossa today. The 6’6,” 229-pound goaltender is attempting to build upon an excellent season with the ECHL’s Toledo Walleye as he transitions to the AHL:

“It’s a big step up and one I want to continue taking for my development,” Cossa said. “I need to prove I can be there first.”

The Red Wings are counting on it. Cossa, who turns 21 on Nov. 21, is expected to team up with newly signed veteran Alex Lyon, 30, and give the Griffins better goaltending than they had last season when they used eight netminders.

Cossa was among the group but wasn’t AHL-ready, posting a 5.57 goals-against average and .783 save percentage, albeit in a small sample size (three games).

The 15th overall pick in 2021 fared much better in Toledo, going 26-16-4 with a 2.56 GAA and .913 save percentage. He went 5-2 in the playoffs, with a 2.32 GAA and .917 save percentage, helping the Walleye reach the Western Conference finals.

“I had some ups and downs, but I thought I had a strong second half and a good push in the playoffs,” Cossa said.

Continued

Kulfan profiles Red Wings prospect Dylan James

Eyebrows were raised when the Red Wings picked 6,’ 185-pound left wing Dylan James with the 40th overall pick in the 2022 NHL Draft, but the Red Wings were satisfied with the progress the 19-year-old University of North Dakota player made this past season, as the Detroit News’s Ted Kulfan noted:

James, 19, showed during his freshman season glimpses of why he’s a legitimate prospect. Playing for one of the nation’s best programs, James had 16 points (eight goals, eight assists) in 36 games and was playing on special teams and late in games as the season progressed.

The 6-foot, 180-pound winger wasn’t overly thrilled with his season. James didn’t like his start to the season and was surprised the transition to college hockey was so bumpy. But if you ask Dan Cleary, the Red Wings’ director of player development, he felt James did just fine.

“He had a good season, the opposite of what he thinks,” Cleary said. “He came in (to North Dakota) and had to find his way. He made some freshman mistakes and had to sit, but that’s all part of it. At the end of the day, I always look at where you are at the end of the season, (and) he was trending upwards. Out there in the last minute, I was in Omaha watching and he scored a great goal shorthanded. He’s playing in the regionals as an important player. … That’s what I look at.”

James, who Cleary described as a “rink rat,” insisted that all went well over the course of the past season…

“Coach [Brad Berry] started to trust me at the end,” said James, who feels his biggest area of improvement needs to come offensively. “Just being able to get into scoring opportunities better, and that comes with my skating. I had a different role (last season). It was hard to score goals. Hopefully I’ll get that opportunity (this season). It was hard as a freshman. You have to gain the trust of your coaches. You usually start at the bottom of the lineup, and I was completely fine with that.”

Continued; James was one of the fastest and most competitive players out there during the summer development camp, so he’s got some skills going for him.

On DeBrincat’s possible DeBounce-back

Daily Faceoff’s Scott Maxwell posted a list of 10 players who Maxwell believes will experience “bounce-back seasons” over the course of the 2023-2024 campaign, and new Red Wings forward Alex DeBrincat leads his list:

Alex DeBrincat, Detroit Red Wings

82 GP – 27 G – 39 A – 66 P (34 G – 34 A – 68 P career 82 game pace)
-0.12 goals scored above expected per 60 (+0.3 career per 60 rate)
10.3% shooting percentage (14.4% career rate)
6.83% 5v5 on-ice shooting percentage (9.09% career rate)

DeBrincat’s brief tenure with the Ottawa Senators is one that both parties will want to forget. The Sens gave up a high price to get the winger, only to have him under-perform and want out one season later, resulting in them losing him for not quite the same return and finding themselves down a top-six forward. And then for DeBrincat, he had an opportunity to prove he didn’t need Patrick Kane to put up 40 goals and now still finds himself needing to prove that to the world.

A change of scenery should certainly help in Detroit, and if he plays alongside Dylan Larkin, that’s a much better option than Drake Batherson or Shane Pinto, who he ended up playing with in Ottawa on the second line. Combine that with his underlying numbers showing that he had some bad luck which aligns with how much he under-performed, and we’ll likely see a better season from DeBrincat. That concern of playing away from Patrick Kane is certainly there, but it’s not like DeBrincat is useless, especially since he had his best season in terms of expected goals output last year.

Continued; we’re going to find out whether DeBrincat can drive play on his own this upcoming season.

Former Wings prospect Jack Adams signs with ECHL’s South Carolina Stingrays

It’s been a rough road for Jack Adams, who suffered a sprained ACL at the Red Wings’ 2019 Summer Development Camp, but the 26-year-old has found a professional home after 5 years in NCAA hockey: