Now that Alex Lyon has fully recovered from his upper-body injury and is expected to start tonight against the Dallas Stars, the Detroit Red Wings no longer require three goaltenders on the active roster. On the chopping block is netminder Ville Husso, who the team announced has been reassigned to their AHL affiliate, the Grand Rapids Griffins.
After passing through waivers unscathed at the beginning of the season, Husso is only one game away from needing waivers for reassignment again. There’s little chance he’s claimed given his subpar play this season and relatively high salary of $4.75MM but any team can become desperate for a goaltender at a moment’s notice.
Still, whether he departs via the waiver wire or unrestricted free agency, Husso is likely entering the last several weeks of his tenure with the Red Wings organization. Detroit acquired Husso as a restricted free agent from the St. Louis Blues in 2022 for a 2022 third-round pick and quickly signed him to a three-year, $14.25MM contract on the same day.
The Red Wings likely had high hopes for Husso to stabilize the team’s production between the pipes given he had just managed a 25-7-6 record in 38 starts for St. Louis with a .919 save percentage. Unfortunately, partly due to the poor defensive play in front of him, Husso has fallen well short of expectations in Hockeytown.
Over 82 starts in Detroit including eight this season, Husso has amassed a 36-32-11 record with the Red Wings with a .892 SV% and 3.26 goals-against average. According to Hockey Reference, despite some blame being laid at the feet of the team’s defense, Husso has produced a more than disappointing -25.6 goals saved above the average line and 3.34 adjusted goals against average.
It’s still amazing to me that Yzerman threw money at Ville Husso based on a 40 game campaign in which his GAA. was above .900 for the first, And only time in his career. That absolutely epitomizes failure on Yzerman’s part.
Because he did it with the Blues defense
I certainly hope they stop dragging Husso up for NHL games. He is an AHL level goalie, we’ve seen enough and I’m sure the team has too. There is nothing wrong with playing in the AHL, it is often more entertaining than NHL. Cossa needs to be the relief goalie for Lyon and Talbot. We can’t keep letting our fruit rot on the AHL vines before harvesting them for the NHL or at least getting their feet wet and bringing them along. . Other AHL level players; Veleno, Motte, and Fischer. Tarasenko should be set out as trade bait. Time to shake this team awake or trade for players who want and can play hard every shift of every game.