0n some nights this season, maybe lots of nights, Steve Yzerman left the rink in a good mood. He scanned the Red Wings organization and saw prospects playing well and the big club winning games and thought to himself, "I'm real happy with the way things are going."
"And then two weeks later you walk out of the rink and you're like, 'Oh my god, there's no end in sight,'" Yzerman said with a chuckle as he wrapped up his fourth season as Red Wings GM.
You can imagine how encouraged Yzerman was when he left Little Caesars Arena on February 23 after the red-hot Wings had beaten the Rangers to continue an improbable push for the playoffs. And you can imagine how vexed he was just five days later in Ottawa, where the Wings were pushed around in a pair of playoff-like games by a tougher, more talented division foe -- a foe they will be very much measured against moving forward. Checking the standings reverted to checking lottery odds as Detroit faded down the stretch.
"What I try to do is just stick with it," said Yzerman.
What other choice does he have? The Wings are on a long road back to relevance, and Yzerman doesn't believe in shortcuts. They did gain ground this year in their rebuild, hitting the 80-point mark for the first time since they made the playoffs seven years ago -- a franchise-long drought, by the way. And while they didn't gain ground in the East, finishing 12th in the standings for the second years in a row, "If I look at the big picture, I'm confident we're going in the right direction," Yzerman said.
He also admitted: "I wish we were farther ahead." The Red Wings need stars in a shiny division, and they don't yet have them.
"I started out saying four years ago, it's going to take time, we're going to have to be patient," Yzerman said. "I would love to sit here and say I'm thrilled with where we're at and how things have gone through four seasons. I've been pleased with some of the development of our prospects and others are taking longer or haven't quite turned out at this point to what we had hoped, but that's OK. As we sit here today from four years ago, I'm not disappointed with where we're at. I guess I'm OK with it."
The Red Wings spent Yzerman's first three seasons tanking to try to hit it big in the draft. Yzerman would never use that word himself, but he admitted as much this season when he said, "Trust me, that was the plan: We're not going to sign good players, we're going to be at the bottom, we're going to suck this up for a few years and get high picks." And in the NHL's lottery system, the highest pick the Wings wound up getting was fourth overall.
So last summer, Yzerman decided to jolt the rebuild in free agency. He went out and spent nearly $80 million to add scoring up front, stability on the back end and more consistency in net. And a narrative formed, Yzerman said, that "we really changed gears and we're making a push and the rebuild is over." But Yzerman didn't expect the Red Wings to suddenly jump back into the playoffs, especially in a deep Eastern Conference. He just expected them to be better, and they were.
"Am I disappointed based on expectations at the start of the year that we didn't make (the playoffs)? No," Yzerman said, "because I was hoping for improvement and for the most part I've seen improvement in our team and in our young players. Now, I expect improvement in the same players next year."
The big gains last season came in the form of Moritz Seider and Lucas Raymond, Yzerman's first-round picks in 2019 and 2020. This season, Yzerman pointed to smaller gains in the likes of Jonatan Berggren, Michael Rasmussen and Joe Veleno, draft picks of the prior regime. Detroit also saw the debuts of Simon Edvinsson and Marco Kasper, Yzerman's first-round picks in 2021 and 2022. He'll make two more first-round picks this summer, and two more next summer. This is the crux of his plan to rebuild the Red Wings, in case it wasn't clear why he asked for patience at the start.
"I wish it was quicker," he said. "We all look around and wish you had more of your prospects ready to go sooner. Some of them are moving in, and again, I wish we had more of them coming. I'm optimistic with some of our guys and truthfully, I was hoping for more from some of them. It doesn't mean they're written off or anything. It's not always linear. There's some ups and downs (in development), it takes time, and they don't all pan out the way you hoped."
Toward the end of his near-hour-long press conference Friday, Yzerman had to remind himself, "There was a lot of good things this year." Like a career-season and a new contract for captain Dylan Larkin, like the emergence of a top-pair defenseman in Jake Walman, like the strong play of goalie Ville Husso prior to an injury, like solid contributions from the free-agent class, say what you will about Andrew Copp and Ben Chiarot. And that's to say nothing of the impact of new head coach Derek Lalonde, who helped the Red Wings play better defensively and much better on special teams.
All of it added up to a surprise playoff push ahead of the trade deadline, before Yzerman dealt Tyler Bertuzzi and Filip Hronek for more draft picks, because the plan is the plan, the moment be damned.
"Nothing is going to dramatically change (this offseason)," Yzerman said. "We'll continue to look for opportunities, as I say repeatedly, to expedite the process, and that is difficult to do."
If he finds any, it will likely go down at the draft. The Red Wings have picks to spare over the next two years, including four first-rounders, and a clear need for a proven goal-scorer. Yzerman could "expedite the process" the same way the Senators expedited theirs at last year's draft by trading a haul of picks, including No. 7 overall, to the Blackhawks for sniper Alex DeBrincat. The 25-year-old fits right in with an impressive young core in Ottawa, where the Wings got a cold dose of reality in late February.
It was an encouraging season for Yzerman, when it wasn't distressing. It filled him with hope, and moments of dread. So goes a rebuild in the NHL. So goes any rebuild in Detroit. Yzerman called the season "an emotional roller coaster, for our fans, myself included." But he has his wits about him at the end of the ride, and the belief that his team is on the right track.
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