The Red Wings 2023-24 season was an insanely fun experience; not only did they play a fast-paced and high-scoring style of hockey, but they also remained competitive for the entire season. Despite some speedbumps late in the season, the team managed to take the season all the way down to the literal last second of the season.
Unfortunately, it was on the back of massive overperformance by a lot of depth players like Daniel Sprong, Robby Fabbri, and Shayne Gostisbehere. These players provided a massive amount of depth offense to cover for whatever defensive or goaltending issues the team had.
This overperformance has caused a lot of people, fans and journalists alike, to have a certain amount of expectations for the team going into this season, even with the team losing a majority of the depth scoring they had last season. The additions of Vladimir Tarasenko and Erik Gustafsson were supposed to replace at least some of the offense the team lost in the offseason. Obviously, neither player has exactly worked out this season.
I believe that last season's success may have been a bad thing in terms of expectations for what the team would be this season, and that has caused a lot of animosity amongst fans.
Overperformance has lead to massive expectations
It was no secret that last season, the entire team vastly overperformed in just about every measurable metric. Per the Hockey Reference website, shooting percentage was 11.6%, which was 1.4% more than the league average, and the Powerplay, much like this season, was one of the best in the league at 23.08%, that's 2.1% more than the league average.
The biggest difference this season compared to last season is the Penalty Kill. Last season, they held a Penalty Kill of 79.58%, which was also above the league average at the time. Goaltending was another factor that played a role in the team's success last season. To start, Ville Husso didn't exactly give the team stellar goaltending, it was enough to get them by at the time. That was until Husso got injured, and Alex Lyon was forced to take the net.
Lyon put the team on his back for as long as he possibly could, allowing the team to go on an absolute tear in the second half of the season with James Reimer holding down the fort when he was called upon. Especially in the last stretch of the season where Lyon started to falter, Reimer came in and gave the Wings good enough goaltending to keep them in the playoff race until the end of the season.
I understand the increased expectations, and they rightfully should be increased season by season. But the team itself is largely the same as last season, just with different names on the jerseys. Tarasenko was supposed to replace Perron, and Gustafsson was supposed to replace Gostisbehere. Neither has fully worked out with the team so far. Not to mention the regression of Ben Chiarot, as well as Justin Holl being in the regular lineup, has hampered the team's already struggling blueline.
While I was hoping for a playoff this season, I knew that this season wouldn't be easy for the team and that playoffs would always be unlikely. Unfortunately, the awful start they had to the season had tanked their season just as it started. But now, with Todd McLellan at the helm and the Wings' young talent starting to make names for themselves, I have faith that next season will be very different from this season.