Why the Wings Won

The most obvious reason the Red Wings won their fourth Stanley Cup in a decade is that top to bottom they are the best organization in hockey and in the end it is the organization that wins. The Wings have a very clear idea as to how they want to play and they find players – often inexpensive ones – with the skills they need to play their game well.

On the ice, the Red Wings do two things better than any other team.

First, they get the puck out of their own end better than anyone else. All seven of their defensemen are good passers and six of their seven (Chelios excepted) are very mobile. Furthermore, the forwards are all very responsible so the defenseman always has a pass to make. If the defenseman is forced to chip the puck along the boards, the forward is always there. If the defenseman has some time, a forward always seems to get open in the neutral zone. Excellent passers and pass receivers who make it easy equals…

In the Stanley Cup Finals, the Wings moved the puck from behind their net to the Penguin’s blue line in a blink.

Second, once the puck is in the opponent’s end, the Red Wings make it impossible for the other team to easily move the puck up the ice. Detroit attacks the puck in a swarm all over the ice. The puck possession meme is a myth. The Wings frequently lost the puck when on the attack in the Pittsburgh end, but when they did they immediately forced the Penguin defense and often recovered it.

The Wings moved the puck up the ice in a blink. The Pens stumbled up the ice fighting through the swarm’s second third and fourth waves. The Wings generated lots of scoring opportunities off neutral zone turnovers and Penguin errors in their own end. The Pens hardly generated anything.

The puck moved very quickly from the Red Wing end of the ice to the Pittsburgh end. It crawled the other way. That’s the essence of winning hockey. The Red Wings won because they were the best puck position team in the league.