Hockey

The Detroit Red Wings announced a coaching change on Thursday, with Todd McLellan replacing Derek Lalonde as their head coach.

The move comes with the Red Wings sitting on 30 points, the second-fewest in the Eastern Conference, through 34 games. They're on pace to finish much worse than last year, when they narrowly missed out on the playoffs.

Detroit collected 91 points in 2023-24 and lost the final wild-card spot through a tiebreaker with the Washington Capitals.

Nobody was putting the Red Wings in the Stanley Cup conversation entering the year, but Patrick Kane returned and Vladimir Tarasenko arrived on a two-year deal. Those are the kinds of moves you make when you want to end an eight-year postseason drought.

Instead, Detroit is anchored near the bottom of the standings. The team is averaging 2.56 goals per game while ranking 25th in goals-against average at 3.27. Lalonde's ouster coincides with a particularly tough stretch defensively. The Red Wings have allowed four or more goals in five of their last seven games.

The fans made their voices heard midway through Monday's 4-0 loss to the St. Louis Blues as they booed the team inside Little Caesars Arena.

Swapping out the coaches is both warranted with the Red Wings' performances and reflects the level of pressure on general manager Steve Yzerman. The franchise legend came aboard in 2019 and has little progress to show since then.

Whether McLellan arrests Detroit's slide could make or break Yzerman's tenure.

This is the fourth stop of McLellan's coaching career. He got off to a roaring start as the San Jose Sharks made the playoffs in each of his first six years, including back-to-back trips to the Western Conference Finals in 2010 and 2011.

However, McLellan's teams have tasted the postseason in just three of his last 10 years on the bench.