Detroit Red Wings forward Alex DeBrincat, who led the club with 41 goals this season, challenged his group to respond to this latest disappointing finish in 2026-27.
While 16 teams are preparing for battle in the Stanley Cup Playoffs, the Detroit Red Wings were once again left cleaning out their lockers at Little Caesars Arena after another disappointing finish.
Despite being tied for first overall in the Eastern Conference in late January, the Red Wings stumbled to a 9-15-5 record during the final 29-game stretch of their centennial campaign, seeing their playoff cushion disappear and ultimately be eliminated from postseason competition last Saturday.
It marks the 10th consecutive season of no postseason hockey in Detroit, not only the longest drought in team history, but now officially the longest active drought in the NHL.
Forward Alex DeBrincat, who scored 41 goals, the most by any Red Wings forward since Marian Hossa in 2008-09, explained that the club needed to channel the disappointment they're currently feeling and use it as fuel for next season.
“Over the summer, we need to bottle up what this feels like and come back stronger,” DeBrincat said. “I think, I feel like we’ve said that the past couple of years, but overall, I think we played good hockey for, you know, 3/4 of the season and put ourselves in a great spot, had confidence. We were coming to the rink ready to play and confident we could beat any team in the League for a long time there."
Not long after the resumption of the schedule following the Olympic break, the Red Wings suffered a 4-3 OT loss to the Vegas Golden Knights on March 4, a game in which they led 3-1 in the third period.
What followed was a series of costly losses, perhaps the most damaging of which was a stunning 4-3 regulation setback against the Florida Panthers. Detroit led 3-2 with 90 seconds left, only to see the Panthers knot the score and then score the go-ahead goal with just 14 seconds left.
While they eventually rebounded with two straight wins over the Calgary Flames and Montreal Canadiens at home, they dropped four of their next five, all against opponents they were jockeying for playoff position against.
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“And that kind of slipped," DeBrincat said of Detroit's lead in the standings. "I don’t know exactly when it slipped or what happened, but then you see the mental side of the game come in, and we feel defeated, and you can see it. We need to find a way to work hard every game to the end of the season."
Following the aforementioned 5–3 loss to the Devils last Saturday that sealed Detroit’s playoff fate, the Red Wings earned a point with a third-period comeback against the Tampa Bay Lightning on Monday. However, they then sleepwalked through an 8–1 loss in their regular-season finale against the Panthers—their largest margin of defeat all season and the most goals the club has surrendered since November 2022.
"I think our last game was probably one of the most embarrassing games I’ve played in myself," DeBrincat said of their lopsided loss. "Everyone, it seems like, we weren’t working hard, and I know it didn’t mean anything, but you could kind of see that creep into our game during that last bit. Very frustrating.”
DeBrincat is set to enter the final season of a four-year deal he signed shortly after being acquired from the Ottawa Senators during the 2023 offseason, but the Farmington Hills, Michigan, native reiterated that he feels comfortable playing in his hometown.
“I love it here. I think we’re still a little far away from even having those conversations, but yeah, this is my home,” said DeBrincat. “I’ve loved every bit of playing here, but I think at the end of the day, it’s a business, so we’ll see what they want to do. But yeah, I love it here.
“I think this is a team I want to be a part of for a long time, and I think everyone knows that. I want to be a big part of changing the culture, and obviously, we’ve done a little bit of that, but there’s still work to do.”
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