On back-to-back late February nights in Ottawa, the '22-23 Detroit Red Wings' playoff aspirations died. By diving into those results, we can better understand the team's off-season renovations.

If the fringe of the playoff race really is a bubble, it didn't take an expert to deduce when the '22-23 Detroit Red Wings' burst.

In the dying of breaths of February 2023, the Detroit Red Wings still harbored postseason aspirations.  Thoughts of a deep playoff run might have been overzealous or fantastical, but there was at the very least a question: Had this Red Wing team played well enough to justify buying at the impending trade deadline?  

After back-to-back games against the Senators in Ottawa, there was no longer any question: A playoff return had to wait.  At a major inflection point on the road back to NHL relevance, the Red Wings fell flat on their collective face, dropping 6-2 and 6-1 results on consecutive nights in the Canadian capital.  

Disappointing though those results were, the two defeats in Ottawa can also be instructive as to the deficiencies of the 2022-23 Red Wings and their subsequent makeover in the summer of 2023.

In discussing a set of games in which a team was outscored 12-3 on aggregate, there is no shortage of growth areas to point to.  Two in particular, however, stand out beyond the others: disastrous special teams execution and a total absence of defensive structure in the neutral zone.

Both the preliminary 6-2 and follow-up 6-1 were wide open affairs, in which Detroit occasionally profited and was frequently burned by the easy passage of the puck from one end of the rink to the other.  On both evenings, Ottawa also managed to maximize their power play opportunities to solidify its advantage in ways the Red Wings couldn't match.

February 27, 2023: Senators 6, Red Wings 2

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On the first goal of the two game set, Tyler Bertuzzi (fresh from the bench and cheating for offense) slipped behind Thomas Chabot then scored with a tidy move past Cam Talbot.  

With that goal, a precedent that would hold through both nights was established: Wide open, end-to-end hockey, in which time and space in the neutral zone abounded.

It was a dynamic that played directly into the Senators' hands.  Whatever deficiencies may remain in the late stages of a long rebuild, Ottawa doesn't want for firepower.  If given power play and transition chances, the Sens can score with any team in the league.  Derek Lalonde's Red Wings couldn't say the same, at least not last season.  The high-paced, offense-happy run of play did the Wings no favors, even if it afforded the occasional break like Bertuzzi's.

Bertuzzi's goal was the only one to come from the first period, and in the second, a pair of Ottawa power play goals sandwiched a David Perron goal for Detroit.  

On both power play goals (first from Jake Sanderson, then from Drake Batherson), the Red Wings allowed the Sens' creators oceans of time and space in high ice, and Ottawa took advantage.  It's not that the Detroit's coverage or pressure were bad so much as non-existent, and once again, whatever Ottawa may lack, it isn't finishing skill.  As Lalonde said in his post game availability, "That team will lose to nobody in the league if you give them six power plays."

Of course, it wasn't as though Ottawa could find time and space only with the man advantage.  The pair of PPGs left the score at 2-2, before the Sens sauntered away on the strength of four unanswered, even strength goals in transition.

First it was Claude Giroux slipping behind everybody to put Ottawa up 3-2.  Then Brady Tkachuk fired home a wrister on a play in which not a single Red Wing offered anything resembling resistance in the neutral zone.  At least Thomas Chabot's goal (the 5-2) came at four-on-four, and there was some way to explain the chasm of space available to him.  Eventually, Tim Stutzle scored of a Red Wing neutral zone turnover to bring the game to its 6-2 margin.

The evening made one thing irrevocably clear: In a track meet, Ottawa had an intractable advantage over the Red Wings.

February 28, 2023: Senators 6, Red Wings 1

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The following evening, Detroit once again took first advantage of the game's lack of structure and Ottawa took best advantage of that freedom to run and gun.

This time, Dominik Kubalik found the opener by catching the Sens in the midst of a change and sniping from long distance.  The Red Wings could find offense in this milieu; the problem is that the Senators could find a whole lot more.

Stutzle answered Kubalik with a penalty shot, and then disastrous breakout execution from Detroit set Austin Watson up for an easy short-handed goal.  Watson would add a second when a Sanderson breakout pass bisected the entire Detroit defense, prompting chaos at the net and eventually yielding a second Watson goal.  3-1, Sens.

On the game's fifth goal, Drake Batherson seemed almost surprised at how much time he had to deliver an incisive pass to Alex DeBrincat, for a one-timed power play goal to make it 4-1 before the first horn sounded.

Giroux would add a fifth to Ottawa's tally on a second period 4-on-3 power play, then Tkachuk would sink the Wings for good with a third period goal to close the book at 6-1.

Over the course of two nights, the Wings were obliterated in Ottawa, and any lingering playoff aspirations went with them.  It was two games, technically speaking, but it felt more like one long lesson.  These Detroit Red Wings couldn't run or gun with the Sens.

The Fallout

Though the end of those lingering playoff fantasies was ignominious, it wasn't the hardest pill to swallow in the grand scheme of things.  The '22-23 Wings were never supposed to make the playoffs, and even the most partisan of supporters couldn't imagine a prolonged run through the spring.

In some ways, it might have been a blessing in disguise.  Buying at the trade deadline would've been short-sighted, and instead, the Wings' lackluster performances in Ottawa provided clarity of direction.

Detroit's greatest vulnerability against the Sens also helps explain Steve Yzerman and company's approach to the 2023 offseason.  

Ottawa wanted track meets, and Detroit acquiesced; even as it became clear this style of play benefited the Sens, the Red Wings were powerless to course correct.  Detroit wasn't able to greet and then counteract Ottawa's offensive flair with structure and stability.

The Red Wings' biggest role of the unrestricted free agent dice is meant to address just that.  J.T. Compher—whom Detroit signed to a five-year, $25 million deal—wasn't a splashy signing.  He's coming off the most productive season of his career, and even that amounted to just 52 points.  However, Compher's 200-foot acumen (it's not just defense but an ability to control the entire ice surface) will help make the 2023-24 Red Wings a more stable operation than their predecessors.

Acquisitions on the back end like Jeff Petry, Shayne Gostisbehere, and Justin Holl are meant to serve a similar purpose.  You can quibble with the individual contract (or in Petry's case acquisition cost), and you might not like that it makes it harder for a player like Simon Edvinsson to break into the regular lineup.  However, the vision here is to instill a baseline level of competence on defense that Detroit lacked in '22-23, when you couldn't in good faith say that the Wings had six NHL-caliber D at their disposal night in and night out.

Of course, the marquee acquisition of the summer, Alex DeBrincat, reflects a different story, but the fact that he comes from Ottawa cannot be ignored in this conversation.

Imposing greater structure couldn't be the Red Wings only response to last season's short-comings; Detroit had to bridge the gap in offensive firepower to a team like Ottawa, and it did so via a direct tact—poaching DeBrincat in exchange for Kubalik, a B-list prospect, and a pair of draft picks.

With Compher, Detroit looks to make itself a stabler team.  With DeBrincat, the Wings become more explosive.  They still won't want to live in shootouts night in and night out, but they have a shiny new toy on the occasions when they do.  DeBrincat represents a goal-scoring threat opponents will have to game-plan around; there hasn't been one of those in Detroit for a while.  Meanwhile, getting the ball rolling on Dylan Larkin's wing figures to get DeBrincat rolling in a way he never hit in his lone season in Ottawa.

Of course, even with these changes, the path to the playoffs remains long, difficult, and far from assured.  Just how much is that remodel worth in the Atlantic Division standings?  Well, we've no choice there but to wait and see.