Tomas Holmstrom Announces Retirement After Fifteen Seasons With Red Wings

by Zack Cox on Tue, Jan 22, 2013 at 7:28PM

One of the pillars of the Detroit Red Wings dynasty of the late ’90s and early 2000s is hanging it up.

Veteran winger Tomas Holmstrom, who spent all 15 of his NHL seasons with the Red Wings, announced his retirement before Detroit’s home game against the Dallas Stars on Tuesday.

Holmstrom was a key member of Detroit’s Stanley Cup-winning teams in 1997, 1998, 2002 and 2008, and the Swedish national team that took home gold at the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin. After returning to Sweden during the NHL lockout of 2004-05, Holmstrom came back with arguably the best season of his career, playing in all but one of the Red Wings’ 82 games and tallying a career-high 59 points (29 goals, 30 assists).

As a fixture in front of the crease, he was known as one of the best in the game at making life difficult for opposing goalies. At age 40, Holmstrom retires with 243 goals and 287 assists in 1,026 career games.

(Photo via Facebook/Official Detroit Red Wings)