{"id":613478,"date":"2026-07-03T08:30:12","date_gmt":"2026-07-03T08:30:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/613478\/"},"modified":"2026-07-03T08:30:12","modified_gmt":"2026-07-03T08:30:12","slug":"kolesar-brings-football-mentality-to-red-wings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/613478\/","title":{"rendered":"Kolesar Brings Football Mentality to Red Wings"},"content":{"rendered":"

One of the newest Detroit<\/a> Red Wings took up hockey because his parents thought it would be good offseason training for football.<\/p>\n

Years later, Keegan Kolesar<\/a> is a Stanley Cup champion and a rugged NHL forward. Acquired by the Red Wings from the Vegas Golden Knights in a July 1 trade, the 6-foot-2, 216-pound Kolesar brings a football mentality to the ice.<\/p>\n

You could say it\u2019s in his DNA<\/a>.<\/p>\n

His father, Charles Peterson, was a highly recruited high school quarterback who instead chose baseball after being the first-round selection of the Pittsburgh Pirates in the 1993 MLB draft. Kolesar\u2019s stepdad, K.D. Williams was a linebacker in the NFL and the CFL.<\/p>\n

In his NFL debut for the Oakland Raiders, Williams picked off future Hall of Fame QB Brett Favre of the Green Bay Packers. In the CFL with the Winnipeg Blue Bombers, Williams set a league single-game record, recording six tackles for loss.<\/p>\n

The gridiron was looking like it would be Kolesar\u2019s destiny as well. As a youngster, he was an inside linebacker for the North Winnipeg Nomads. Then one fateful day, almost by happenstance, he would end up at a hockey rink.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy parents wanted me to stay in shape for football,\u201d Kolesar said. \u201cThey said, \u2018Well, let\u2019s put him on ice skates to see if he can play.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cI just did a complete 180 on them, and just said, \u2018Hey, I don\u2019t like football anymore.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cAll I honestly wanted to do was just to play with my best friends. You know, 20 years later, now here I am. It\u2019s fun. <\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m just a Canadian kid who wanted to play hockey. That\u2019s all it is.\u201d<\/p>\n

Newest Red Wings Player a Punishing Hitter<\/p>\n

He may have traded cleats for skates, but football still pulses through Kolesar. He\u2019s one of the NHL\u2019s hardest hitters. <\/p>\n

Kolesar was seventh in the NHL with 270 hits last season. His hits per 60 minutes average was 17.12.<\/p>\n

Since becoming an NHL regular in 2021-22, Kolesar has dished out 1,309 hits. That\u2019s an average of 261.8 hits per season.<\/p>\n

\u201cMaybe that\u2019s an element that I can bring that keeps people on their toes, keeps D men backing up more,\u201d Kolesar said. \u201cAnd when you have that, and you have a D man that\u2019s going back to the puck over and over and over again, looking over his shoulder, sometimes you\u2019re going to make a mistake. <\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s when a good forecheck can lead to opportunity in the offensive zone.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Kolesar is also quite willing to drop the mitts if he sees an opponent in need of an attitude adjustment. According to Hockeyfights.com<\/a>, he\u2019s fought 35 times as an NHLer.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou try to bring guys into the fight every night,\u201d Kolesar said. \u201cI think guys look to the leaders of the team. <\/p>\n

\u201cIf I can be one of those older guys that comes in and shows guys, you know, hey, like, we\u2019re going to go in there to the trenches tonight and see who wants to follow me, maybe it uplifts the guys a little bit more.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"One of the newest Detroit Red Wings took up hockey because his parents thought it would be good…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":613479,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5101],"tags":[599,1511,93,5137,5,3710,4,3358,5138],"class_list":["post-613478","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-detroit-red-wings","tag-detroit","tag-detroit-hockey-now","tag-detroit-red-wings","tag-detroitredwings","tag-hockey","tag-keegan-kolesar","tag-nhl","tag-red-wings","tag-redwings"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116855113219611867","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/613478","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=613478"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/613478\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/613479"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=613478"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=613478"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=613478"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}