DETROIT — There is a massive elephant in the Detroit Red Wings dressing room.
“No,” rookie forward Dylan Larkin says, “we’re not talking about it.”
“I don’t think anybody’s talking about it,” adds defenceman, Danny DeKeyser. “I don’t think he wants anyone to talk about it—he wants us to stay focused on the playoffs.”
He is Pavel Datsyuk. And the elephant in the room, of course, is that this is likely his final season in the NHL.
Ahead of Tuesday night’s Game 4 at Joe Louis Arena, there’s a chance Red Wings fans may be seeing the last of The Magic Man on home ice, too.
There are plenty of ifs involved here, of course: If the Red Wings lose on Tuesday, and again on Thursday, requiring no return to Detroit for Game 6. (Tampa has a 2-1 lead in the series).
And if Datsyuk is, as he said last week, moving home to Russia after this season to be closer to his 13-year-old daughter and the rest of his family, a comment he hasn’t since addressed, insisting his focus is on the playoffs.
And, finally, if GM Ken Holland and the rest of the Red Wings brass can’t convince Datsyuk to play out the remaining year of his contract, instead of leaving them with a $7.5 million cap hit.
(And, if fans chanting “One more year!” and holding signs begging Datsyuk to stay isn’t an effective tactic).
But what’s certain is this: In a series that’s been plenty physical, with two games ending in brawls, and one of them with a Brian Boyle chicken dance, there may be bad blood, but you’ll find more than a few Datsyuk fans in the Tampa Bay Lightning locker room. It’s less an elephant in there.
They want Datsyuk to lose, sure, but they also want him to stay in the league. Nikita Kucherov’s eyes get bigger and his eyebrows raise when he talks about lining up against his countryman.
“Being here, playing against him—it’s a fun time,” says the 22-year-old right-winger, who grew up in Moscow. “Trying to compete against one of the best players in the world is unreal.
“He’s such a smart guy. He knows where the puck is gonna be. It’s tough to explain. It’s something he’s born with.”
Lightning centreman Valtteri Filppula spent the first seven years of his career in Detroit. “I looked up to him, trying to see what he does out there. Unfortunately, a lot of the stuff is too hard to do,” the 32-year-old Finn says, laughing.
“I feel like every game he did something and everybody was on the bench going, ‘How did that happen?’ ‘How did he do that?’ There were a lot of those.”
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If Game 4 is Datsyuk’s final in Detroit, if this 14th season in Detroit is his last, the fans will give the 37-year-old a send-off to remember. You might think making the playoffs for 25 straight years (it’s not a streak, if you ask captain Henrik Zetterberg, it’s “tradition”) would mean Red Wings supporters take for granted what it is to make the first round of the post-season.
That’s not happening here.
In Game 3, the ‘Let’s Go Red Wings’ chants were deafening starting 10 minutes before puck drop. It was a sea of red jerseys and towel-waving in the crowd. They had a seemingly endless supply of octopuses to toss onto the ice. And there were more than a few kids holding up “One more year!” signs, directed at No. 13.
Datsyuk has been held without a point in this series, but the three-time Selke winner is +2, with 12 shots on net. “We gotta keep the puck away from him as much as we can,” Kucherov says.
Filppula reiterates that. “You just have to try to stay close to him, not give him room and hope for the best,” he says. “You see his hands—it’s unbelievable. He does things not a lot of guys, if anybody, can do on that level.”
Hockey Night in Canada broadcaster Bob Cole was at a Red Wings exhibition game 14 years ago the first time he heard about Datsyuk.
“Brendan Shanahan came along and said, ‘We got a new guy in camp the other day, wait ‘til you see him,’” Cole recalls. “He was so good with the puck. He’s been like that his whole career. The hands.”
Red Wings rookie Andreas Athanasiou grew up watching Datsyuk highlights on YouTube.
“When I was playing minor hockey, I always tried to do the kinds of things he’s done, from growing up watching him,” says the 21-year-old from Woodbridge, Ont. “To be on the same ice as him, it’s kind of an honour.
“Some of the things he does? It’s out of this world.”
Adds DeKeyser: “You might not even think he saw you on the ice, but he’ll find you somehow.
“If this is his last year, it’s unfortunate. We’ll miss him.”
Red Wings players and fans aren’t the only ones hoping for one more year from Datsyuk. So are the guys on the other side of this series, the same players who are trying to make Datysuk’s post-season end in the next couple of games.
“It’s a little sad,” Kucherov says. “I don’t know what’s gonna happen with him next year. I want him to play. I want him to be on our team, actually. I want us to play together.”
The Lightning winger realizes that’s highly unlikely, of course.
“Yeah,” he says, smiling, “but I wish.”
