The Detroit Red Wings shocked the NHL and hockey world when they selected defenseman Moritz Seider with the sixth overall pick in the 2019 NHL Entry Draft. Leading up to this draft, Seider was thought to be a mid-first-round pick. Seider would continue to shock the NHL by winning the Calder Trophy as the rookie of the year. As the best defenseman on the Red Wings’ current roster, Seider is a draft pick that has worked out for general manager Steve Yzerman.
Defenseman Antti Tuomisto was drafted by the Red Wings with the 35th overall pick in that same 2019 draft. The scouting report before the draft was that Tuomisto had a powerful shot and was a smooth skater at 6’5” and 205 lbs. Tuomisto has yet to play a game in the NHL. In 67 games played for the Grand Rapids Griffins of the American Hockey League, Tuomisto has scored three goals and added 24 assists.
The challenge for Yzerman has been finding a defensive pair to fill out the Red Wings’ top pairing. Simon Edvinsson was drafted by the Red Wings with the sixth overall pick in the 2021 NHL Entry Draft. At 6’6”, the Kungsbacka, Sweden native was dubbed by the captain of the Red Wings, Dylan Larkin, as part of the “Swedish basketball team.” After making his debut for the Red Wings in March of 2023, Edvinsson has quickly become an important part of the team’s defense alongside Seider.
Larkin, a Waterford, Michigan native, was drafted by the Red Wings out of the University of Michigan with the 15th overall pick in the 2014 NHL Entry Draft. Larkin was tasked with leading the Red Wings through the team’s rebuild. After Henrik Zetterberg was forced to retire due to a back injury, Larkin was named captain of the Red Wings on January 13th, 2021. Other than one season when the Red Wings lost a first-round series to the Tampa Bay Lightning in five games.
Yzerman was drafted by the Red Wings with the fourth overall pick in the 1983 NHL Entry Draft. Mike and Marian Ilitch had bought the team the year before Yzerman was drafted. At this time, the Red Wings were in the middle of a stretch that was derisively called the “Dead Wings era.” The team had not made the Stanley Cup playoffs in five seasons. In Yzerman’s rookie season, the team would make it to the Stanley Cup playoffs, losing in four games to the St. Louis Blues. In 80 games played, Yzerman scored 39 goals and added 48 assists.
During his 22-year career, all with the Red Wings, Yzerman won three Stanley Cups. Two of these were won in back-to-back seasons in 1997-98 and 1998-99. The Red Wings were the last team to win back-to-back Stanley Cups before the Lightning winning the Stanley Cup during the 2020-21 and 2021-22 seasons. Yzerman was responsible for building these Lightning teams as he was the general manager for the team from 2010 to 2018.
A large part of the Red Wings’ roster during the 25-year playoff streak was the Russian five. Sergei Fedorov, Igor Larionov, Vladimir Konstantinov, Vyacheslav Kozlov, and Viacheslav Fetisov all played on one line during a game against the Calgary Flames. Three of these five players were drafted by the Red Wings. Due to the feelings towards Russian players by the NHL at the time, the question was whether this Russian five experiment would work.
Jacques Demers was the head coach of the Red Wings from 1986 to 1990. In that time, the team began to ascend. During the 1986-87 season, the Red Wings finished in second place in the Norris division with 78 points. Ownership knew the team needed an upgrade at the position. At the time, head coach of the Montreal Canadiens, Scotty Bowman, had won four straight Stanley Cups.
“I knew it would work,” Red Wings head coach Bowman recalled later. “The one worry I had was [that] the league would learn how to play against them, so I decided to play them together at first only a few times a game. Some games I waited until the third period to put the unit in.”
I previously wrote that the Red Wings drafting Filip Zadina with the sixth overall pick in the 2018 NHL Entry Draft was a mistake. This draft was yet another example of the Red Wings’ draft position falling in the lottery. Zadina terminated his contract with the Red Wings to sign with the San Jose Sharks in July of 2023. Recently, Zadina extended his contract with HC Davos of the Swiss National League. This was one of the roster moves made by former general manager Ken Holland that did not work out.
The last time the Red Wings had the number one overall pick in the NHL Draft was when they selected right-winger Joe Murphy with the first pick in the 1986 NHL Entry Draft. Murphy played nearly 800 games in his NHL career for seven teams. In four seasons for the Red Wings, Murphy only scored 24 goals. Murphy won the Stanley Cup with the Edmonton Oilers during the 1989-90 season.
ITR 47: Then There Was Nothing – Inside The Rink
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