Detroit Red Wings Trivia
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55 free Detroit Red Wings trivia questions with answers — sports quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
This Detroit Red Wings trivia quiz covers a century of Hockeytown, from the Cougars who played their first season across the river in Windsor to the Yzerman era and the current playoff drought. It starts with the things every fan knows: the octopus, the winged wheel, the Original Six, the Journey song. Then it digs into the Production Line and Terry Sawchuk, the first woman to run an NHL club, the Dead Wings years, Mike Ilitch's purchase, and the drafting of a Peterborough center named Steve Yzerman. The 1990s and 2000s get their due: Scotty Bowman, the 62-win season, the Russian Five, the 42-year drought ending in 1997, the Konstantinov tragedy, the Avalanche brawl, the 2002 and 2008 Cups, Lidstrom's seven Norris trophies and Datsyuk's magic. It finishes with the 25-year playoff streak, the move to Little Caesars Arena and the retired numbers. Every answer has been checked against the team's Wikipedia page and those of its players, and each explanation adds one detail worth remembering.
30 of 55 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Under what name did the Detroit franchise enter the NHL in 1926?
Cougars
Cougars: the Detroit group bought the players of the Victoria Cougars of western Canada and kept the name, until the struggling club became the Falcons in 1930.
Q 02The Red Wings' winged-wheel logo was inspired by the emblem of which club?
The Montreal Amateur Athletic Association
The Montreal Amateur Athletic Association's hockey team, the Winged Wheelers, won the first Stanley Cup in 1893; Detroit's new owner had once been a member and borrowed its emblem in 1932.
Q 03Detroit's 2008 championship brought the Red Wings' Stanley Cup total to what number?
11
11: the 2008 title was the fourth in a run that began in 1997, yet before that run the club had gone 42 years without a Stanley Cup.
Q 04Where did the franchise play its first season in 1926-27 because no Detroit rink was ready?
Windsor, Ontario
Windsor, Ontario: with the Olympia still unbuilt, the team spent all of 1926-27 across the river at the Border Cities Arena and did not play a home game in Detroit until November 1927.
Q 05What nickname is registered as a trademark of the Red Wings for the Detroit area?
Hockeytown
Hockeytown has been a Red Wings trademark since 1996, though tiny Warroad, Minnesota, had been calling itself Hockeytown USA first.
Q 06What sea creature do Red Wings fans throw onto the ice during the playoffs?
An octopus
The octopus tradition began in the 1952 playoffs, when an octopus's eight legs matched the eight wins then needed to claim the Stanley Cup.
Q 07What was the name of the giant mascot raised to the rafters before Red Wings home playoff games?
Al
Al is named for Al Sobotka, the team's longtime Zamboni driver, who whirled the fans' offerings above his head as he carried them off.
Q 08Which Journey song do Red Wings fans sing along to at home games?
Don't Stop Believin'
Don't Stop Believin': the recording is turned down so the crowd can sing the line about being born and raised in South Detroit by itself.
Q 09Which coach and general manager ran the Red Wings for more than three decades from 1927?
Jack Adams
Jack Adams coached Detroit to three Stanley Cups, though his 1942 team became the first to lose a Final after leading three games to none; the NHL's coach-of-the-year award bears his name.
Q 10What was the famous 1940s-50s trio of Gordie Howe, Sid Abel and Ted Lindsay called?
The Production Line
The Production Line, a nod to Detroit's car factories, finished first, second and third in NHL scoring in 1949-50: Lindsay, Abel, then Howe.
Q 11Which Red Wings goaltender joined Howe, Abel and Lindsay for the 1952 sweep to the Cup?
Terry Sawchuk
Terry Sawchuk did not allow a single goal on home ice in the 1952 playoffs, posting four shutouts as Detroit swept both series in the minimum eight games.
Q 12Who became the first woman to head an NHL franchise when she took over the Red Wings in 1952?
Marguerite Norris
Marguerite Norris took charge after her father died in 1952 and in 1954 became the first woman with her name on the Stanley Cup, but her brother Bruce ousted her a year later.
Q 13Tony Leswick's Cup-winning overtime shot in 1954 went in off which Montreal defenseman's glove?
Doug Harvey
Q 21From which junior team did the Red Wings draft Yzerman in 1983?
Peterborough Petes
Peterborough Petes: the 18-year-old was the first draft pick of Detroit's new owners, went fourth overall, and led the team in scoring as a rookie with 87 points.
Q 22Steve Yzerman led Detroit's 2002 Cup run in scoring despite playing through severe damage to which joint?
Knee
Knee: Yzerman, Detroit's captain since 1986, topped the team with 23 playoff points on one good leg, then had the joint surgically realigned and missed most of the next season.
Q 23Yzerman's 155 points in 1988-89 trailed Gretzky and whom?
Mario Lemieux
Mario Lemieux took the scoring title with 199 points to Gretzky's 168, yet NHL players voted Yzerman, with 65 goals, the league's most outstanding player that season.
Doug Harvey, who went on to be named the NHL's best defenseman seven times, tried to glove Leswick's shot and instead tipped it past his own goalie, ending Game 7 at 4:29 of overtime.
Q 14Ted Lindsay was traded to Chicago in 1957 largely for doing what?
Helping start a players' union
Helping start a players' union cost Lindsay his place in Detroit in 1957; no union took hold then, and a permanent players' association only arrived a decade later.
Q 15Gordie Howe was born in which Canadian province?
Saskatchewan
Saskatchewan: Howe was born in a farmhouse at Floral, tried out for the New York Rangers at 15, went back home, and signed with Detroit the following year.
Q 16Gordie Howe won six scoring titles and which other trophy six times?
Hart Trophy
Hart Trophy: Howe was named most valuable player six times between 1952 and 1963, yet he topped 100 points in an NHL season only once, at the age of 40.
Q 17What is a 'Gordie Howe hat trick'?
A goal, an assist and a fight in one game
A Gordie Howe hat trick is a goal, an assist and a fight in one game; Howe himself managed it only twice, both in the 1953-54 season.
Q 18Gordie Howe retired at 52 after a final NHL season with which team?
Hartford Whalers
Hartford Whalers: Howe had retired from Detroit in 1971, came back two years later to play beside his sons Mark and Marty, and in 1979-80 played all 80 NHL games, scoring 15 goals.
Q 19What derisive nickname was given to Detroit's long slump from 1967 to 1982?
The Dead Wings
The Dead Wings made the playoffs only twice in 16 seasons, in 1970 and 1978, a slump that ended once new owners began rebuilding through the 1983 draft.
Q 20Which pizza chain founder bought the Red Wings in 1982?
Mike Ilitch
Mike Ilitch bought the Red Wings in 1982 and, a decade later, bought baseball's Tigers from a rival pizza mogul, Domino's founder Tom Monaghan.
Q 24Which coach, hired in 1993, led the Red Wings to three Stanley Cups?
Scotty Bowman
Scotty Bowman is the only coach to win the Stanley Cup with three different teams, and he went out on top: he retired right after Detroit's 2002 title, his record ninth.
Q 25The 62-win 1995-96 Red Wings lost the conference final to which team?
Colorado Avalanche
Colorado Avalanche: in their first season after moving from Quebec, the Avalanche beat a Detroit team that had won a then-record 62 games, took the series in six and went on to lift the Stanley Cup.
Q 26Detroit ended a 42-year Cup drought by sweeping which team?
Philadelphia Flyers
Philadelphia Flyers: Detroit won all four games and held Flyers captain Eric Lindros to a single goal, scored with 15 seconds left in the series; Darren McCarty got the Cup winner.
Q 27Which goaltender won the Conn Smythe Trophy in Detroit's 1997 Cup run?
Mike Vernon
Mike Vernon went 16-4 in the 1997 playoffs to earn the Conn Smythe, then was traded to San Jose that summer, handing the net to Chris Osgood.
Q 28Which defenseman's career ended in a limousine accident six days after the 1997 Cup win?
Vladimir Konstantinov
Vladimir Konstantinov suffered severe brain injuries in the June 13, 1997 crash; the next spring his teammates wheeled him onto the ice to touch the Cup after sweeping Washington.
Q 29What was the nickname of the Red Wings' 1990s group of Soviet-born players that included Fedorov, Larionov and Fetisov?
The Russian Five
The Russian Five, completed by forward Slava Kozlov and a second Soviet-trained defenseman, first took the ice as a full five-man unit in October 1995 and won the Stanley Cup together in 1997.
Q 30Whose hit from behind on Kris Draper in the 1996 playoffs sparked a bitter Red Wings rivalry?
Claude Lemieux
Claude Lemieux's check drove Draper face-first into the boards, breaking his jaw, nose and cheekbone; Darren McCarty took revenge on him in a brawl-filled game in March 1997.