Terry Sawchuk once said of goaltenders, “We are the sort of people that make health insurance popular.” Many times in the Detroit Red Wings’ history, the club’s goaltenders were insurers in and of themselves.
Some all-time great netminders have played for Detroit across the past 98 seasons of the franchise. The likes of Sawchuk, Dominik Hasek and Harry Lumley belong to the Hockey Hall of Fame. Some alumni are multi-Stanley Cup champions, such as Chris Osgood, Mike Vernon and Normie Smith. They were unbeatable, unflappable, and in the endearing way of many goalies, unhinged.
Who are the best goalies to ever play for the Detroit Red Wings? Here’s The Hockey News Detroit’s top five Red Wings goaltenders of all time.
5. Harry Lumley
The starter in five of his six seasons with Detroit, Lumley was one of the NHL’s best in the 1940s. He ranks fourth all time in wins (163), third in shutouts (26) and 10th in goals against average (2.75) among goalies who played at least 100 games for the Red Wings. In 1950, he backstopped the first Stanley Cup win of the Gordie Howe era, tallying three playoff shutouts in 14 games that postseason.
Had it not been for a certain rookie named Terry Sawchuk taking his place, Lumley might be more respected in the canon of Detroit goaltending history. Instead, he was traded to the Chicago Blackhawks, soon spending stints with the Toronto Maple Leafs and Boston Bruins. He won the Vezina Trophy with the Leafs in 1954 after posting 13 shutouts in the regular season, a record that stood until 1970. But it was his time in Detroit that showed his best play, including three of his four career 30-win seasons.
Lumley was inducted to the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1980.
4. Jimmy Howard
Whether due to his relative recency, his elite predecessors or his career decline, Jimmy Howard is one of the most underrated goaltenders in Red Wings history.
Howard’s 246 wins rank third all-time, his 24 shutouts rank fourth and his eight seasons with 20 wins or more rank third among all Red Wing netminders. No goaltender has faced more than his 13,970 shots against since the statistic has been tracked, and his 15,313 lead recorded history, too.
Such dominance came quickly for Howard, who started 60 games as a rookie and won 37 of them. He placed second for the Calder (Tyler Myers won it that year), then finished eighth for the Vezina. After names like Osgood, Hasek. Manny Lagace and Curtis Joseph played for the franchise before him, Howard kept the standard and more in his era.
Unfortunately, injuries started to hold Howard back toward the end of his career, and this coincided with an overall aging of the Red Wings at the end of the franchise’s 25-year playoff streak. He played his final game in 2020 and now serves as an occasional TV analyst on Bally Sports broadcasts.
3. Dominik Hasek
Before anyone gets up in arms about Hasek being ranked too low, know that he would be at the tippy top if this were a list of the top NHL goaltenders of all time. But in Detroit’s history, the brevity of his Red Wings career knocks him down the ranking a bit compared to some accomplished lifers.
After winning the Vezina six times out of his eight seasons as Buffalo’s starter, Hasek joined the Red Wings in 2001-02 and won his first Stanley Cup. He added another in 2008, retiring after the season at 43. Hasek never won the Vezina with Detroit, but he did win the William M. Jennings in 2008.
The hardware doesn’t show just how good Hasek was, however. Statistically, he was dominant playing behind the 2001-02 Red Wings, a team with 10 Hall of Famers including the 2014-inducted Hasek. He won a career-high 41 games with a .915 save percentage and 2.17 goals against average that year. That’s one of just five seasons in Detroit’s history in which a goalie won 40 games or more by themselves. In his career, he finished with a .911 save percentage and a 2.13 goals against average, which rank fourth and second, respectively, among goalies to play 100 games for the franchise. He retired right after that Stanley Cup win, then came back after a season and played four more years of NHL hockey, three of which came with Detroit.
In terms of his overall career, Hasek is one of the greatest to ever play goal. Hasek checks in at No. 3 on this list, however, because his time with the Red Wings was short-lived and on the tail end of his career. A groin injury ended his 2003-04 comeback, then hurt his hip in the Olympics when he played for Ottawa coming out of the lockout in 2005-06. In 2006-07, Hasek found his health and his form with a 38-11-6 season with a .913/2.05 stat line. The next season, his final in the NHL, he split the net with Osgood, earning the starting job to begin the playoffs before Osgood took the reins after two games.
While he was an elite goaltender, Hasek wasn’t the Dominator he used to be when he was in Detroit. He didn’t really have to — he still won a lot, and saved a lot of goals. As much as his overall career achievements are better than the goalies ranked ahead of him on this list, his resume with the Red Wings isn’t as strong as a couple of other alumni.