The Detroit Lions will play in their first NFC Championship Game against the San Fransisco 49ers on Sunday, January 28th, 2024. The Lions defeated the Tampa Bay Buccaneers by a final score of 31-23. The Lions were not the only Detroit team to beat the city of Tampa Bay in an athletic competition in the city of Detroit on Sunday, though. These two teams have had very different histories as Detroit earned the moniker of Hockeytown.
The Detroit Red Wings defeated the Tampa Bay Lightning by a final score of 2-1. Lucas Raymond scored the first goal after Victor Hedman of the Lightning opened the scoring. Alex Lyon once again proved that he should be the starting goalie of the Red Wings, making 27 saves. Lyon has filled in admirably since Ville Husso went down with a hip injury. The starting goalie for the Lightning, Andrei Vasilevskiy, lost his first game in the city of Detroit despite making 33 saves.
For two cities to match up in the same city for two sporting events is a rarity. The last time the Lions played the Bucs was 1997, when the Buccaneers defeated the Lions by a score of 20-10 in the Wild Card round. Oddly enough, the Red Wings won the Stanley Cup that same season when they swept the Philadelphia Flyers in the Stanley Cup Final. The Lions finished that season with a 10-6 record. The season after this the Lions finished 5-11 while the Red Wings won their second of back-to-back Stanley Cups, sweeping the Washington Capitals.
At the halfway point of the NHL, the Red Wings are in a playoff position. The same thing happened during the 2022-23 NHL season, but the team lost one game to the Lightning and back-to-back games against the Ottawa Senators. These three games led to general manager Steve Yzerman trading players such as Tyler Bertuzzi to the Boston Bruins. This type of losing streak cannot happen again if the Red Wings want to make the playoffs for the first time in seven seasons. Beating Vasilevskiy and the Lightning in the city of Detroit is a good start.
