Holland's transition game
The days of the Red Wings spending way more money than most teams and shipping off prospects and draft picks to pick up veterans for a Stanley Cup run are gone. They ended when the lockout ended. But this franchise has made a remarkable transition into the new NHL. General manager Ken Holland is very bright and he deserves a ton of credit for keeping Detroit among the league's elite. Many felt the Red Wings would fall off the face of the planet when payrolls equalized, but nothing of the kind has taken place.

Holland said goodbye to some veterans after last season. Gone are Todd Bertuzzi, Kyle Calder, Robert Lang, and Mathieu Schneider. Bertuzzi and Calder weren't with the Red Wings long enough that they will be missed. They were brought in for the playoffs and were not part of the core of the team that posted the top record in the Western Conference and tied the Sabres for the most points (113) in the league.

Lang had an adversarial relationship with Babcock. His ice time has been taken by Valtteri Filppula, who is in his second full NHL season and has a great relationship with Babcock. The coach believes Filppula can be among the top six forwards on any team. So replacing Lang has not been an issue.

Schneider was a key member of Detriot's blue line. Once he departed as a free agent for Anaheim, Holland went after Rafalski, a top-notch, free-agent addition who comes over from the Devils. While Rafalski won't score as many goals as Schneider, he's a better skater who is excellent defensively with his stick. And on a power play he gets pucks through from the point as well as anyone in the league.

Factors in their favor
There is much talk about Detroit's puck control as the Red Wings play a style that can't be found on a lot of other teams. They want to control the puck more than they want to chip it in and go and get it. The problem with that is when the puck is turned over there's likely going to be a real quality scoring chance the other way. But the Red Wings have a great sense of how to handle the puck and that's why this style works well for them.

What's underrated about the Red Wings is how committed the players are to competing and how hard they play. They are mentally tough, physically durable, and emotionally in control. Part of why this is can be traced to Babcock and part of it comes from the type of players brought in by Holland. Babcock pushes his players hard. They're giving everything they've got every time they hit the ice. That's what makes them so formidable.

The Central Division is again Detroit's for the taking. The Red Wings have won it the last six seasons, but that is not what this team is measured by. The Red Wings are judged by how they fare in the playoffs. Last season they advanced to the conference finals, the first time they made it out of the second round since their Cup-winning season of 2002. They fell to Anaheim, a team that was able to combine finesse, talent, and skill with brute force.

The Red Wings are as good as they were last season. They answered the question of whether they were too old a club by their long playoff run last spring. There's star power on this team and there's depth. This is not a team in decline, but rather one worthy of being labeled a bona fide Stanley Cup contender. It should not come as a great surprise if this season ends with more rings for the Wings.

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