The Red Wings leading goal scorer this season is Dylan Larkin with 26 goals. While this is on pace to be the best season by a Red Wing since Marian Hossa in 2008-09, 13 teams in the NHL have at least one player with more goals this season with another two teams having a player who matches his total. With a leading goal scorer that would be considered middle of the pack, how have the Red Wings, who haven’t finished even in the top 20 in goals since 2014-15, found themselves fourth in the NHL in scoring at this stage of the season? By far the biggest reason has been their depth scoring.
The Red Wings lead the NHL with 12 players having at least ten goals this season. Not only is it the most, but the Vancouver Canucks are the only other team in the entire NHL with even ten players to reach double-digit goals this season. It’s also already the most they have had in an entire season since having 13 in 2010-11 and they still have 23 games remaining this season to add more potentially. On top of that, Shayne Gostisbehere is just one goal away from hitting double digits following his two-goal night on Tuesday and Mo Seider is three away himself. There’s a very good chance they tie their single-season record of 14 by the end of the year.
Obviously, having a lot of players score double-digit goals is gonna help you reach the upper echelon of scoring leaders. What also helps is that six of these players have at least 15 goals. There are playoff teams that only have six players with at least ten, but the Red Wings have six with 15 and that’s what pushes you ahead of some of the teams who have elite scorers like the Tampa Bay Lightning, Boston Bruins, Florida Panthers and Edmonton Oilers.
What’s Changed?
So, what’s the difference between this season and last season? In 2022-23, the Red Wings only had seven players reach double-digit goals and three of those players aren’t in Detroit this season. Two such players found new teams in the off-season; Dominik Kubalik via trade and Pius Suter via free agency. The other, Jonatan Berggren, has spent the majority of this season in Grand Rapids with the Griffins. So, if you’re sending a 15-goal scorer down to the AHL for basically the entire season, you must have brought in players there to replace that scoring, right? That’s exactly what Steve Yzerman did.
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