The Detroit Red Wings fired coach Derek Lalonde and replaced him with Todd McLellan, the biggest change general manager Steve Yzerman has made in more than a third of a disappointing season in the area known as “Hockeytown.”
The move on the day after Christmas comes with the Red Wings on a three-game skid and have lost nine of their last 12. They have lost 21 of their first 34 games this season and are ahead of the lowly Buffalo Sabers in the Eastern Conference. .
Lalonde is almost halfway through his third season with Detroit after winning two Stanley Cups as a Tampa Bay assistant. Yzerman inherited Jeff Blashill as coach when he left the Lightning for the Red Wings in 2019 and hired Lalonde in the summer of 2022 with the goal of returning the team to the playoffs.
Despite signing three-time Stanley Cup champion Patrick Kane in 2023 and re-signing him last season, success has not reached the Red Wings’ glory days when they won the Cup four times between 1996-97 and 2007-08 – three times with Yzerman as captain and former teammate. in the front office. Instead, their playoff drought is on track to reach its ninth year — second longest in the league behind Buffalo.
Associate coach Bob Boughner was also fired and Trent Yawney was hired to work on McLellan’s staff as an assistant. McLellan signed a multi-year contract to begin his fourth NHL head coaching job after stints with San Jose, Edmonton and Los Angeles.
McLellan, 57, has coached his team to the playoffs in nine of his 14 full seasons behind the bench. He returns to the Motor City after getting his first major league job as an assistant with the Red Wings in 2005 and working under coach Mike Babcock during the 2008 title run.
The player from Melville, Saskatchewan, was recruited by the Sharks after leading them to three Western finals. Most recently, McLellan was fired by the Kings in February during the All-Star break and has been negotiating other positions since then.
This is the fourth coaching change in the NHL this season and the 15th this calendar year, counting the retirement of Rick Bowness in Winnipeg. The Boston Bruins in November fired Jim Montgomery, who was hired by the St. Louis Blues less than a week later, and the Chicago Blackhawks traded Anders Sorensen for Luke Richardson in December.
