Sizing up Detroit Red Wings’ opponents in new Central Division: Who’ll come out on top?

Ryan Ford

| Detroit Free Press

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It’s hard not to look at the NHL’s realignment for the 2020-21 season and feel like the Detroit Red Wings landed in the clearance aisle of divisions — All rivalries must go! — for this 56-game season.

The North features all the Canadian teams — it’s big geographically, but at the start of the day, they’re all headed to Tim Hortons, eh?

The East is pretty much an Amtrak ride from Boston to Washington, with beer runs to Pittsburgh (Yuengling!) and Buffalo (Labatt Blue!) thrown in.

The West is California, states that want to be California (Hi, Arizona, Colorado and Nevada) and Minnesota and Missouri (essentially the designated driver of the West’s playoff party).

And then we have the Central, featuring the remnants of the old Southeast (Carolina, Florida and Tampa Bay), the old Central (Chicago, Columbus, Detroit and Nashville) and, well, Dallas. (Somebody had to take the Stanley Cup runners-up, we guess.)

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For the Wings, at least, they’re familiar rivals, with all the teams having shared a division at some point in the past … 25 years? (Oh, those matchups with the Stars in the four-division days of the late 1990s.) And they’re about to get a lot more familiar, as the Wings will face each of their seven new division-mates eight times (with four sets of two-game series) even before the playoffs feature two rounds of intra-division play.

But before we get to that point, let’s make some quick introductions around the division, shall we?

Carolina Hurricanes

2019-20 record: 38-25-5 (81 points); lost, 4-1, in first round.

The big addition: Carolina hasn’t exactly opened the wallet in free agency recently, which is why their big signing was Jesper Fast, who had 29 points in 69 games with the Rangers last season.

Why they’re better than the Red Wings: Any line featuring Sebastian Aho (38 goals) and Andrei Svechnikov (37 assists) gets the highlights, but the ’Canes might have the division’s best defensive paring in Dougie Hamilton and Jaccob Slavin, who finished seventh and fifth, respectively, in Norris Trophy voting.

Why they’re worse than the Red Wings: The ’Canes made it through last year — narrowly, considering they won a game with 42-year-old emergency goalie David Ayres at one point! — with a goalie tandem of ex-Wing Petr Mrazek and James Reimer. After an offseason that featured one of the deepest free-agent goalie markets ever, who’s starting in Carolina? Mrazek and Reimer. OK.

Chicago Blackhawks

2019-20 record: 32-30-8 (72 points); lost, 4-1, in first round.

The big addition: The last Swiss league MVP the ’Hawks signed — Dominik Kubalik (30 goals, third in Calder voting) — worked out pretty well, so they’re trying it again with Pius Suter, who had 30 goals in 50 games en route to the MVP award.

Why they’re better than the Red Wings: Chicago stole their qualifying-round series against Edmonton thanks to point-a-game (and then some) performances from Kubalik, Jonathan Toews, Patrick Kane, Olli Maatta and Duncan Keith. Those guys are still with the Blackhawks (though Toews is missing camp with an extended undetermined illness), meaning few teams can light it up as well when everything clicks.

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Why they’re worse than the Red Wings: The four goalies on the roster right now are Collin Delia, Kevin Lankinen, Malcolm Subban and Matt Tomkins; they have a combined 81 NHL appearances (68 of which are Subban’s) and a .903 save percentage. If you could identify one of them before reading this with anything more than “P.K. Subban’s brother,” you’re either a dedicated Blackhawks fan, or GM Stan Bowman.

Columbus Blue Jackets

2019-20 record: 33-22-15 (81 points); lost, 4-1, in first round.

The big addition: The Canadiens were so willing to get rid of former first-rounder Max Domi after two seasons that they threw in a 2020 third-round pick to get Josh Anderson, who had just one goal in 26 games in 2019-20. Domi had played his way down to the fourth line in Montreal’s playoff run, but he’s only a year removed from a 28-goal, 44-assist season.

Why they’re better than the Red Wings: The narrative of a Blue Jackets squad that will out-grit and out-grind almost any team under coach John Tortorella isn’t wrong, but grit-and-grind is a lot easier when you have Joonas Korpisalo and Elvis Merzlikins in net. Korpisalo made history with 85 saves in the Jackets’ quintuple-overtime loss to Tampa Bay in Game 1 of the first round, and Merzlikins had five shutouts in 31 starts en route to a fifth-place finish in both Calder and Vezina trophy voting.

Why they’re worse than the Red Wings: No one reached 50 points last season (though 24-year-old Oliver Bjorkstrand had 36 in 49 games) and the Jackets’ other big addition was 37-year-old Mikko Koivu, who had four goals last season in Minnesota. In other words, don’t expect the Columbus offense to improve much from its 27th-place finish last season. (And yes, the Wings were 31st in offense, though at least Dylan Larkin broke the 50-point mark.)

Dallas Stars

2019-20 record: 37-24-8 (82 points); lost, 4-2, in Stanley Cup Final.

The big addition: Uh …. Can we interest you in a slightly used Mark Pysyk (18 points, plus-4 with Florida) on defense? But seriously, the Stars’ biggest addition was a re-signing: Goalie Anton Khudobin, the backup who carried the Stars to within two wins of the Cup despite never having started a playoff game before. He’ll get lots of work as the starter early, with two-time All-Star Ben Bishop out until at least March after knee surgery.

Why they’re better than the Red Wings: The Stars finished 29th in scoring, though that might have been a bit depressed by their 1-7-1 start (including an opening night 4-3 loss to Anthony Mantha) in which they managed only 17 goals. But in the playoffs? No team scored more goals, thanks mainly to defensemen Miro Heiskanen (age 20, 26 points) and John Klingberg (age 27, 21 points). Stars coach Rick Bowness likes to play them in separate pairings, meaning Dallas almost always has one standout puck-handling defenseman on the ice.

Why they’re worse than the Red Wings: Remember that “29th in scoring” thing? It won’t get any easier for the first few months as top points-getter Tyler Seguin (17 goals, 33 assists) will be out until perhaps April with a torn labrum.

Florida Panthers

2019-20 record: 35-26-8 (78 points); lost, 3-1, in qualifying round.

The big addition: Patric Hornqvist is the dependable 20-goal scorer added via trade, but the intriguing signing is forward Anthony Duclair, who inked a one-year deal with Florida more than two months after NHL free agency began. Why the wait? It may have had something to do with virtually no NHL player having a worse 2020 than Duclair did: He had 21 goals in 40 games through Dec. 31, 2019, then scored two in 26 games between New Year’s and the end of Ottawa’s season in March. Still, at just $1.7 million this season, the 25-year-old could be a steal.

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Why they’re better than the Red Wings: No other team in the NHL has a two-time Vezina Trophy winner, much less one who’s a year removed from leading the league with nine shutouts. Goalie tandems will be important this season, but the Panthers didn’t sign Sergei Bobrovsky to a seven-year, $70 million contract before last season expecting to sit him for half the season.

Why they’re worse than the Red Wings: They also didn’t sign Bobrovsky to that deal to get a .900 save percentage and 3.23 goals-against average, which is what he posted in 50 games last season — a big reason why Florida was 27th in goals allowed in 2019-20. How will the 32-year-old hold up during the Panthers’ eight back-to-backs this season?

Nashville Predators

2019-20 record: 35-26-8 (78 points); lost, 3-1, in qualifying round.

The big addition: A surprise loss to the Coyotes in the “pre-playoffs” didn’t spur big changes for the Preds, who’ll return most of their core group that finished 17th in goals scored and 14th in goals allowed. One under-the-radar signing was forward Erik Haula on a one-year deal. If he’s the Haula that netted 29 goals for Vegas in 2017-18 and 12 goals in 41 games for the Hurricanes last season, it’ll be a steal. If he’s the one that had three points and a minus-3 rating in 11 regular-season and playoff games for Florida in 2020? Well, there won’t be much howling in Nashville.

Why they’re better than the Red Wings: It’s easy to stick with your core when it includes the reigning Norris Trophy winner — Roman Josi, who also led the Preds with 65 points. He’ll pair with Ryan Ellis, who was fourth on the team with 38 points in 49 games, on the blue line.

Why they’re worse than the Red Wings: Just five teams were older than the Preds’ average age of 29.1 (the Wings checked in at 28.6) in 2019-20, which could be a problem with nine scheduled back-to-back games, including six in the first two months. (The Wings have three back-to-backs in January and February.) Goalie Juuse Saros, 25, appears ready to take the No. 1 spot, but will the Preds have to rely on 38-year-old franchise icon Pekka Rinne as his backup too much?

Tampa Bay Lightning

2019-20 record: 43-21-6 (29 points); Won Stanley Cup, 4-2.

The big addition: The Stanley Cup! The Bolts went from winning the Presidents’ Trophy and flaming out in the first round in 2019 to storming (sorry) through the 2020 playoffs with a league-best 78 goals and plus-21 goal differential (in 25 games). Good thing, too, since the Cup will take some of the edge off how the Bolts will replace leading scorer (and 2019 MVP) Nikita Kucherov, who will miss the regular season after hip surgery.

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Why they’re better than the Red Wings: Did you watch the playoffs? They made that postseason run with only 2:47 of total ice time from captain Steven Stamkos — remember when he was the Wings’ No. 1 free-agency target? — who should be healthy this season. Even the Kucherov surgery paid off, with his stint on long-term injured reserve sparing them from cutting perennial 20-goal scorer Tyler Johnson.

Why they’re worse than the Red Wings: Uh … The defense isn’t quite as stacked as last season’s corps, with Kevin Shattenkirk, Braydon Coburn and Zach Bogosian departing in free agency. That could open some minutes later in the season for top prospect Callan Foote, a 22-year-old who has posted 59 points in 138 games in the AHL over the past two seasons. And yes, Foote is the son of former Colorado defenseman Adam Foote, adding one more level of rivalry to the Wings’ new division.

Contact Ryan Ford at rford@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @theford.