3 ways to enliven the Red Wings-Maple Leafs rivalry
The NHL will ring in the new year with an outdoor clash between two Original Six clubs.
The Toronto Maple Leafs will host their first outdoor game at BMO Field when the Detroit Red Wings come to town. The game represents their second outdoor matchup in three years since both teams took the ice at Michigan Stadium in 2014.
The 2014 installment will surely go down as one of the better outdoor games the league has arranged, but as the sequel approaches, it doesn't have quite the same allure - and the reason for this is the lack of a rivalry.
Sure the Red Wings and Maple Leafs have gone to war in the past, but that's the problem - it was in the past. With the Red Wings only recently returning to the Eastern Conference, the teams haven't played many heated games against each other, and because of that, bad blood between them is almost nonexistent.
The two clubs used to meet regularly in the Stanley Cup Finals, but that was the product of having just six teams in the league. Though that's no longer possible, here are three ways to resurrect the Red Wings-Maple Leafs rivalry.
A playoff series
The best and easiest way to create a rivalry: Play meaningful games against your foe. This all starts in the postseason.
The Maple Leafs and Red Wings haven't met in postseason play since their memorable first-round series in 1993. The Maple Leafs edged the Red Wings in overtime of Game 7 thanks to Nikolai Borschevsky's iconic tip-in goal.
However, even that series was just the teams' third playoff meeting since the 1963-64 season. While the Maple Leafs have made just one playoff appearance over the last 11 years, one could argue that's given Toronto a hatred for the Boston Bruins after the way their 2013 series ended.
A series reminiscent of that one in any way could be all the Maple Leafs and Red Wings need to develop some animosity. Rivalries can be built, but teams generally need a reason to despise each other.
Regular outdoor games
If the NHL wants to make Toronto vs. Detroit a rivalry through these outdoor games, the league should really embrace it.
Instead of meeting every couple of years, the Maple Leafs and Red Wings could play every Jan. 1 and make it a real spectacle.
The clubs could alternate hosting the event, and they're close enough that die-hard fans would make the trek when their side is the away team. An annual game would build history and wouldn't necessarily be looked at as just another regular-season contest. Players would have last season's meeting in the back of their minds, teams would look for redemption, and fans would be glued to their seats New Year's Day.
Matthews vs. 2017 No. 1 pick
This next one would take some luck, but could create an instant rivalry.
After reaching the playoffs for 25 straight seasons, the Red Wings are currently flirting with the worst record in the Eastern Conference, and could approach the worst in the entire league if things don't change.
So it's not out of the realm of possibility that Detroit will not only miss the playoffs, but nab a top draft pick - and the Winnipeg Jets proved this past year that you don't need to finish last to move up and steal a star.
If next season kicked off with a meeting between 2016 first overall pick Auston Matthews and a No. 1 selection of the Red Wings, we could have new reason to get rowdy about this rivalry.
While we're on the subject of the Red Wings' quarter-century playoff streak, if the Maple Leafs somehow ended up being the team to stick the final dagger in Detroit's run, that could create some hatred too.