Well, that sucked. The Wild were flying high (some people even crowned them as good at hockey) after beating up on Arizona and Las Vegas. And then they got steamrolled by Colorado. Two games and a combined score of 11-1 not in Minnesota's favor.
Ouch.
The problem, it turns out, was that Colorado's first line is full of really good players and the Wild just didn't have an answer. So it felt like the Avalanche could score at will. The good news here is that those games are over and Minnesota only meets Colorado for 2 games of their remaining 27. So there's some time to maybe figure out a better strategy.
Speaking of the remaining 27 games, the Wild schedule really settles into a pattern here after this week. Minnesota gets a three day weekend with no games in the upcoming weekend, and that will be the last time this season they get two days off in a row. There are 7 sets of back-to-back games in the last 7 weeks, so we're going to see a lot of hockey if we so desire (hopefully hockey that looks like two weeks ago more than this past weekend).
This week's schedule:
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The Ducks are bad and getting worse. Playing them at home should be the perfect palate-cleanser after that bitter pill in Colorado. Anaheim has struggled to score all year, but have been pretty good at keeping the puck out of the net. If the Wild can score some goals, they should be good here.
Thursday is the first game against St. Louis all season. The Blues have been hurt by injuries and bad goaltending, but have capitalized on a soft schedule to maintain their place in the top 4 of the West. If the Wild have any thoughts of getting home ice in the playoffs, they will need to win a good number of the 8 remaining games against St. Louis.
- Vegas - 43 points (29G)
- Colorado - 40 points (29G)
- Minnesota - 37 points (29G)
- St. Louis - 37 points (31G)
- LosAngeles - 32 points (30G)
- Arizona - 31 points (31G)
- San Jose - 26 points (29G)
- Anaheim - 24 points (32G)
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The Kirill Kaprizov Corner
It was a slow week for highlights in general. Colorado did a pretty good job of limiting Kaprizov and Zuccarello and everyone else.
On the rookie leaderboards, Kaprizov's first in goals (10), first in assists (15), and first in points (25).
Kaprizov is in the top 15 in the NHL in even-strength points (23).
Players not Named Kirill
The injury list has a couple important guys out for now.
- Foligno is still out - the Wild miss the defensive winger, and that series against Colorado might be a strong argument for Foligno as team defensive MVP.
- Dumba hurt his ankle(?) in game one and was missed as well. He's had a really solid season, which was nice to see.
Leaderboards
| Player | G | Player | A | Player | Pts | Player | GAR |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Eriksson Ek | 11 | Kaprizov | 15 | Kaprizov | 25 | Eriksson Ek | 6.8 |
| Kaprizov | 10 | Greenway | 15 | Greenway | 20 | Foligno | 6.6 |
| Fiala | 9 | Zuccarello | 15 | Zuccarello | 20 | Brodin | 6.1 |
| Foligno | 7 | Foligno/Suter | 9 | Foligno | 16 | Kaprizov | 5.4 |
| Rask | 7 | Brodin/Parise | 9 | Eriksson Ek | 16 | Soucy/Rask | 4.8 |
So, the Ducks did is a favor by starting Ryan Miller. It would be good to actually take advantage of that.
Ryan Suter.
Power play goal.
Sorry, it wouldn't let me put those two phrases in the same comment for some reason.
Ducks put 4 players in the COVID protocol and cancel practice.
Nail-biting time.
Parise on the COVID protocol list.
I don't like this.
hopefully this is just a nicer way of saying healthy scratch
Suter to Spurgeon twice in the first period.
More power play success! (3 of their last 5 goals have been PPG - 21% over the last 5+ games)
that's a weird start time...
I assume because the Wild play tomorrow. They get almost 24 hours of rest.
Nico Sturm with the go-ahead goal.
He's a player that has had a sneaky good season.
😬😬😬
10-game home winning streak. Nothing to sneeze at.
Talbot made a lot of good saves to hold the lead.
Yikes, the Blues come to town tomorrow with 2 full days rest (haven't played since Monday).
The Wild look tired already. I don't have high hopes for tomorrow's game.
Wild talking contract extension for Kaprizov. The headline surprised me, as we just got him. The article has a decent breakdown of next years salary cap situation. I was also surprised to see we have more maneuvering room than I expected.
Math is weird in that article:
13 players signed already for 21-22.
Proposed roster spots for ...
Addison
Fiala - RFA
Eriksson Ek - RFA
Hartman - RFA
Kaprizov - RFA (kind of)
Boldy
Rossi
Which is seven players. 13+7 = 20. Active rosters are 23 players, so they'll need more contracts than that.
The cap numbers are off too. He takes away Addison's 800K salary from 22.8M and gets 28M which is some pretty favorable math.
So in reality, the Wild have 20M for the 4 RFAs mentioned, plus the need to add probably three more players to the roster. Starting to get a little bit tighter.
Just tuned in preparing to make a Grandpa Simpson turn around. Score is fine so far, but the shots likely tell about the type of game I've missed so far.
Faulk slap shot sticks in Talbot's mask?
That's a new one for me.
Was going to say the same thing. Right in his eyehole.
*chef's kiss*
Kaprizov is fun.
I just started laughing when he scored that.
Unreal.
$36 million dollar man Jordan Binnington having a fun day.
.750 save%
That's ... not good.
The goalie should have stopped that but it was still filthy
The Wild have good records this year when they have a lead heading to the dressing room.
Leading after 1 -- 12-1-0
Leading after 2 -- 12-0-1
Leading after 3 -- 16-0-0
In Cam Talbot's last 11 periods in goal, he has 124 saves on 132 shots (.939 SV%).
That's ... quite good (and a lot of shots allowed).
The Avalanche are scary good.
5-1 over Vegas tonight.