Nick Lidstrom’s No. 5 officially retired by the Detroit Red Wings
By Stefan Kubus –
Gordie Howe, Sid Abel, Ted Lindsay, Alex Delvecchio, Terry Sawchuk, Steve Yzerman and now Nicklas Lidstrom.
On Thursday night, Lidstrom watched his No. 5 raise to the rafters, an honor only bestowed upon those six Red Wings players over the course of 70-plus years of history. When he entered the league in 1991, he said he never envisioned his career culminating with this event.
“It seemed so much bigger than I could imagine,” Lidstrom said. “Gordie Howe, Ted Lindsay, Terry Sawchuk, Stevie’s up there… It’s such a tremendous honor to have my jersey up there, as well.”
The Original Six club hosted a ceremony at 6:30 p.m. Thursday to honor their former captain and raise his jersey to the rafters. Other players whose numbers have been retired were on hand to honor the latest addition to their club, while Mark Howe represented his father Gordie, and family members were present for Terry Sawchuk and Sid Abel. Steve Yzerman was unable to be in attendance.
Former teammates in attendance to support Lidstrom included Darren McCarty, Igor Larionov, Bob Rouse, Robert Lang, Brendan Shanahan, Vladimir Konstantinov (who received a standing ovation of his own), Tomas Holmstrom, Chris Chelios, Kris Draper, Manny Legace, Larry Murphy, Chris Osgood, Tomas Holmstrom and Kirk Maltby. Former coaches on hand included Scotty Bowman, Barry Smith and Dave Lewis.
Current Red Wings captains Henrik Zetterberg, Pavel Datsyuk and Niklas Kronwall presented Lidstrom with a trip to Africa for him and his family, while the Red Wings ownership gave him a new Dodge Ram truck.
Mike Babcock, Ken Holland and Christopher Ilitch gave speeches during the event, which was emceed by Ken Daniels. Perhaps the most memorable line from the speeches was when Holland said, “boy, do I miss watching No. 5 play.”
The Red Wings currently hold the longest active postseason appearance streak of any professional sports team – 22 seasons – and Lidstrom manned the blue line for 20 of them. Prior to his jersey retirement ceremony, he said the most emotional aspect would be seeing old teammates and reliving old memories inside the historic Detroit arena.
“I still miss coming in here, getting ready for a game or walking out onto the ice in front of 20,000 people.”
But on the flip side, it’s not just the playoff battles and screaming fans he’ll miss.
“I miss the times that you don’t see every day, when you’re in here with the guys, you’re traveling with the guys, you’re out there for practices and there’s no one really in the building.”
The things he said he definitely doesn’t miss? The long road trips out to the western U.S. and Canada, and defending against the three players he called his most formidable foes: Jaromir Jagr, Mario Lemieux and Wayne Gretzky.
In 1,564 NHL games played, Lidstrom amassed 264 goals and 878 assists for 1,142 points, along with an astounding plus-450 rating. That’s good for fourth all-time in Detroit franchise scoring, as well as third among all Swedish-born players, behind only current Red Wings forward Daniel Alfredsson and former Maple Leafs forward Mats Sundin.
“It makes it even more special that I’ve been a Red Wing my whole career. I was able to finish as a Red Wing and now I’m getting my jersey up there in the rafters as a Red Wings.”
On a lighter note, Lidstrom said that now he’s living in Sweden, any time he comes back to Detroit, he finds himself spending the night at an old teammate’s house.
“I’ve stayed at Homer’s house in his basement for a few different occasions,” Lidstrom said with a laugh. “We sold the house and didn’t keep anything here.”
When asked what he’s enjoying most in retirement, the first thing the former third-round draft pick replied with was having weekends off, when he usually watches his kids – he has four sons – play hockey. And at home in Sweden, Lidstrom still watches the Red Wings, NHL highlights and the Swedish pro teams as often as possible.
“My life still has a lot of hockey involved in it.”
While he’s still enjoying retirement, Lidstrom said he could see himself involved in the NHL or Red Wings organization in some capacity down the road.
“After living in Sweden for a few years, I might get the urge to be involved in the NHL on a closer level than I am now. It could happen, you never know.”
If nothing else, one thing is for certain going forward: the No. 5 will forever be his.