THN Archive: Red Wings' Datsyuk Earned Respect of Peers in 2012 NHL Player Poll

In his 14-season NHL career, forward Pavel Datsyuk was one of the league's top two-way forwards, and he helped the Detroit Red Wings to a pair of Stanley Cup championships. This story from THN's Archive dug into all the reasons Datsyuk was successful and earned the respect of players around the league.

The Detroit Red Wings became a dynamo in the 2000s. In this cover story from THN’s March 19, 2012 edition (Vol. 65, Issue 20), THN senior writer Ken Campbell put the spotlight on one of the key reasons for Detroit’s success – superstar forward Pavel Datsyuk.

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Datsyuk never took home a Hart Trophy as the league’s most valuable player, and he’s never been a front-runner for the Art Ross Trophy as the NHL’s top point producer. But in a THN 2011-12 player poll, Datsyuk was named the second-best player in the league behind Pittsburgh Penguins icon Sidney Crosby. And that’s because he always made the players around him more dangerous.

“The biggest thing about him is that he makes everyone around him better, whether it’s the guys on his line or next to him in the room,” said then-Toronto Maple Leafs blueliner Mike Komisarek. “Everyone around him is a better player.”

Players and coaches who saw Datsyuk on a daily basis saw his incredible talents up front. For example, a Wings practice saw him rim pucks rim around the boards, and Datsyuk would knock them down and roll out. And that skill was on display during real Detroit games.

“(Y)ou see him do it all the time in a game,” San Jose Sharks coach Todd McLellan, a former Red Wings assistant coach, said to Campbell. “The puck is coming along the boards, he knocks it down, he rolls out and there’s two defenders left on the wall. A lot of guys line up pucks and shoot them or they make passes, but we were doing things after practice that nobody else in the league was doing.”

Ultimately, Datsyuk was revered for his all-around game, and though he retired from NHL in 2016, his legacy as a difference-maker remains.

“(T)here’s no cheat in his game,” McLellan said.

Vol. 65, No. 20, March 19, 2012

By Ken Campbell

So you’re an NHL defenseman and No. 13 for the Detroit Red Wings is carrying the puck and closing the gap on you. Well, that’s just dandy, isn’t it? Lots of things are going through your mind. Most of them are fear-based. For the most part, you’re pondering about you’re going to keep your body between him and your own net. And if you’re the San Jose Sharks Brent Burns, you think the following: “TSN Top 10,” he said. “Don’t be on it.”

Pavel Datsyuk has never won a Hart Trophy as the NHL’s most valuable player. Never even come close, really. He finished a distant third in 2009 and ninth in voting in 2008 and has never finished in the top 20 in any other season. He has never been a first-team all-star, has not posted a 50-goal or 100-point season. In fact, he didn’t even make the all-rookie team in 2001-02. Kristian Huselius did, though. How messed up is that?

But ask anyone who really knows the game – players, coaches and GMs – and almost every one of them will say if Datsyuk is not the best player in the world right now, he’s most certainly in the top three. That’s consistent with the THN 2011-12 player poll, which placed Datsyuk second in the league behind Sidney Crosby. We polled 150 NHLers, five from each team, using a weighted system and the proviso they couldn’t vote for teammates. Crosby was the runaway winner, garnering nearly 23 percent of the overall voting points. But Datsyuk was a runaway second, at 13.3 percent, almost double that of No. 3, Claude Giroux. It’s also consistent with a poll of 275 players commissioned by the NHL Players’ Association and Hockey Night in Canada, in which Datsyuk finished first in six categories: smartest player (in a landslide over Crosby and Nicklas Lidstrom); most difficult to play against (even more than Zdeno Chara, impressively); most difficult to take the puck from (47 percent – next best was Evgeni Malkin at 10 percent); most difficult for goalies to stop (surprising, since he’s never scored more than 32 goals in a season); cleanest player (four Lady Byng Trophies, duh); and toughest forward to play against (even whumped Milan Lucic on that one).

But the most telling of them all came at the All-Star Game when Chara selected Datsyuk with the first overall pick, but not before clearing the transaction with his own Boston Bruins teammate, Tim Thomas. When you have a chance to get Datsyuk on your team, allegiances and loyalties go out the window.

Perhaps it has something to do with his 1-on-1 abilities on both sides of the puck. Or the highlight-reel goals. Or the low center of gravity that makes it almost impossible to knock him off the puck. Or his attention to detail. Or his defensive play. Or his sick moves. That’s the thing with Datsyuk. Ask his peers about him and invariably they get to the point in the conversation when they start just throwing their hands up and shaking their heads. After all, how many different ways can you say a guy is great? “The biggest thing about him is that he makes everyone around him better, whether it’s the guys on his line or next to him in the room,” said Toronto Maple Leafs defenseman Mike Komisarek. “Everyone around him is a better player. I know our coaches have put him up on video and used him as an example for our young guys.”

Sharks coach Todd McLellan thinks he has an idea of what makes Datsyuk tick. When he was an assistant with the Red Wings, McLellan marveled at how hard Datsyuk worked at his game. For Datsyuk, the games are fun and practice is when he goes to work. McLellan remembers spending time after practice rimming pucks around the boards about two feet off the ice, where Datsyuk would knock them down and roll out. “And you see him do it all the time in a game,” McLellan said. “The puck is coming along the boards, he knocks it down, he rolls out and there’s two defenders left on the wall. A lot of guys line up pucks and shoot them or they make passes, but we were doing things after practice that nobody else in the league was doing.”

In fact, McLellan believes that if Datsyuk were willing to cheat a little on the defensive side of the game and cut corners, there’s no doubt he could win a scoring title. “But there’s no cheat in his game,” McLellan said.

No cheat indeed. Despite an array of moves that can make defensemen look silly, Datsyuk has never put up enormous numbers. He once had back-to-back seasons of 97 points, but has never been considered an elite scorer. Which is strange because when you watch the moves he makes 1-on-1, you wonder why he doesn’t regularly put up monster offensive seasons. There are probably a couple reasons for that. First, when he’s not playing against the best shutdown forwards and defensemen in the game, he’s the one doing the shutting down. His game in all three zones is impeccable and he plays the hard minutes that tax the body so much. He also plays in a team-first system where anybody not named Nicklas Lidstrom simply blends in with a bunch of really good players who are adept at winning games and Stanley Cups.

But perhaps his greatest personal triumph is the fact he’s the only player in NHL history to win the Selke and Lady Byng Trophies in the same season. Twice. Think about that for a minute. Not only does he shut people down, he does it really hard and tenaciously without taking penalties.

Yes, it’s clear Datsyuk has put the sexy personal accolades aside to make those around him look better. Which begs the question: Would he be an even bigger star if he played for another team and had the stage all to himself? “I’m happy to say,” said Red Wings coach Mike Babcock, “that’s one question where we’re never going to know the answer.”

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