Dylan Larkin still showing up for Red Wings
If Dylan Larkin wants to win back the Detroit Red Wings‘ fanbase, Tuesday night was a pretty good start. After requesting a trade out of Detroit in June and having his captaincy stripped before the season, Larkin has been booed at every opportunity by Red Wings supporters, including when he touched the puck for his first shift in his season debut on Tuesday.
As the game went on, however, those same fans were reminded that Larkin is stil Detroit’s best forward, as he notched a goal and an assist en route to a 5-3 win over the Ottawa Senators, the Red Wings first of the season. Larkin even stuck up for a teammate, getting in the face of Senators forward Ridly Greig after his reverse hit on Alex DeBrincat.
On Wednesday’s episode of Daily Faceoff LIVE, hosts Tyler Yaremchuk and Carter Hutton discussed Larkin coming up big for Detroit while dealing with the crowd’s vitriol.
Tyler Yaremchuk: I still think this situation is a mess. I feel for Red Wings fans, I feel for everybody involved. But I will give him some credit for going out and at least playing hard here while he’s still got the jersey on.
Carter Hutton: I still think there’s a lot of pride in him. You don’t get to the NHL, you don’t become a captain without having pride. It’s tricky for him to walk back into that locker room, but I will say that these are professional athletes playing with him and they’re going to accept him and they’re going to deal with whatever hoopla goes on. I think more of the storyline here, Ty, is what if he continues to play well? What if he continues to score goals and the Wings keep winning games? Then you’re sitting here like, is there a chance for this to be rekindled? They went to couples therapy and they’re going to move forward and try his relationship again. I just think there’s so many interesting takes.
I also saw online it was $7 to get in, the price for a ticket. And I saw the Wings banner going around, there wasn’t enough fans to keep it moving. It’s just kind of sad for an organization that spent so many years at the top of the podium. It’s a very interesting time in Detroit.
You can catch the full discussion and the rest of Wednesday’s episode here…
