Detroit – The Detroit Red Wings’ protected list Sunday morning offered only one minor surprise.
Jimmy Howard is the protected player at goaltender, rather than Petr Mrazek, as lists were released Sunday in anticipation of the expansion Vegas Golden Knights putting their team together.
The Golden Knights will publicly make their list known Wednesday during the NHL Awards Show in Vegas.
As expected, Danny DeKeyser, Mike Green and Nick Jensen are protected on defense, while Justin Abdelkader, Andreas Athanasiou, Anthony Mantha, Frans Nielsen, Gustav Nyquist, Tomas Tatar and Henrik Zetterberg are the forwards protected.
That leaves players such as Mrazek, defensemen Jonathan Ericsson, Niklas Kronwall, Xavier Ouellet and Ryan Sproul, and forwards Luke Glendening, Darren Helm, Tomas Nosek and Riley Sheahan left unprotected.