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Red Wings And The Myth of Back to Backs

Detroit was 6-4 in second game of back to backs last season

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3 weeks ago

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Derek Lalonde Red Wings coach
Red Wings coach Derek Lalonde often talks about the challenge of playing back to back games. But is it really all that difficult?

Coming off a poor third period and a 6-4 loss to the Anaheim Ducks on Friday, the Detroit Red Wings are in trouble.

If you don’t believe it, just ask them.

“Back to backs are challenges, especially three in four,” Red Wings coach Derek Lalonde said.

It’s the traditional NHL mantra. The myth of the back to back.

In less than 24 hours, the Red Wings will be back at it, facing the Los Angeles Kings.

They’re just so hard to complete, how can any team survive?

Well, we’re here to call it all, as the Brits would say, poppycock.

Two games in less than 24 hours. The way NHLers explain it, this is a more daunting task than scaling Mount Everest while wearing Crocs.

It’s got to be a hard sell with the average working person who’s asked to work back-to-back-to-back-to-back-to-back every week. And eight-hour shifts every day at that.

Come on now, fellows. They’re only asking you to work one hour each day. And even that’s not entirely correct. Beyond the netminders, nobody’s working more than about 25 minutes a night. Even after losing defenseman Simon Edvinsson on Friday when he was hit in the knee with a shot, Moritz Seider was Detroit’s leader in ice time. He skated 25:04.

“It’s a lot different, especially the travel,” Lalonde said, continuing to sell us on the demanding ask of back to backs.

Ah yes, the travel. To make matters worse, before Saturday’s game, they’ve got to make the grueling 26.3-mile journey from Anaheim to Los Angeles.

Even were the trip longer, for us ordinary folks who have to travel for a living, we’re not flying on chartered jets and staying at five-star resorts.

Yet for elite, supremely-conditioned professional athletes, with nutrionists, physical therapists and medical staffs at their immediate disposal, this is arduous, unbearable, a bridge too far.

Red Wings Back To Back Numbers Don’t Add Up To Trouble

That’s the myth the NHL types have been fabricating forever, and people buy it hook, line and sinker. Even though the facts, the data and the reality of the scenario show this argument to be patently untrue.

Last season, the Red Wings went 5-3-1 in the first game of back to backs. In the second game, they slumped to 5-4.

That’s right. Detroit’s record on the first night and the second night were virtually identical.

So much for that onerous test that is the second game of a back to back. And if you want to argue small sample size, we’ve got that argument covered, too.

ESPN Stats And Information did a five-year study of the NHL and back-to-back games from 2020-24, covering 3,090 games. The record for the team on a back-to-back in those games over the two legs was .531.

Teams won the first half of a back-to-back at a .553 clip. The winning percentage in the second game was .507. Home teams went .555, while visiting teams were .520.

One in four teams swept both halves of a back to back. Three in 10 teams lost both games of the two in two nights gauntlet.

And if that’s not enough to convince you that back to backs aren’t that challenging to overcome, just ask the Grand Rapids Griffins. Last month, the Griffins played three games in three nights, all on the road. And unlike pampered NHL starts, those guys are usually traveling by bus.

Grand Rapids went 3-0.

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