Strong Start! Wild Wednesday
Strong Start
The Wild are proving to be tough competition as they are 2-0-2 through their first four games and have yet to trail in a game so far. The Wild have looked strong even though there have already been a few obstacles along the way, but for them to secure six of the possible eight points so far, there is little to complain about.
Round-Trip Ticket
Unfortunately for Wallstedt, it seems the 21-year-old goaltender will be floating between Iowa and Minnesota much more than he initially anticipated. While coach Hynes did say some of it will be performance based on who gets starts this season, the main decider on whether Wallstedt stays on Minnesota’s roster depends on the health of the team, which already has taken some hits.
Wallstedt was reassigned to Iowa the night of home opener due to defenseman Declan Chisholm being sick, but was called back up Saturday to back Fleury up against the Seattle Kraken. But the injury bug quickly hit as Eriksson Ek took a nasty elbow to the face resulting in a broken nose and Spurgeon sustained a lower-body injury at some point during the night as well. Marcus Johansson was also questionable to play Sunday against Winnipeg, he ultimately played, but had to miss last night’s game against St. Louis due to an undisclosed injury. With those injuries, the Wild really had no choice but to reassign Wallstedt back to Iowa on Sunday so they could add another defenseman, Daemon Hunt, and forward, Travis Boyd to travel with the team.
Boyd was reassigned to Iowa on Monday, but since Johansson did not play, the Wild decided to go with seven defensemen and had Kaprizov doubling up on the second line with Boldy and Hartman. Forward Liam Ohgren also had his NHL debut on Sunday and played last night.
While Wallstedt was originally anticipating his first start to be against St. Louis last night, it was not feasible with the Wild’s current situation. Wallstedt also carries a $925,000 cap hit, which means he will likely always have to be the one sent down in order to even afford another player. So, as long as Gustavsson and Fleury remain healthy, Wallstedt will spend a lot of time traveling between Iowa and Minnesota this season.
Blind Officiating
In Saturday night’s game against the Kraken when Ek suffered an elbow straight to the nose, there was no penalty on the play.
Eight seconds later in the second period, Brodin is called for a phantom tripping on Brandon Tanev, who really should have been called for embellishment.
The official realized how bad the call was after watching the replay and apologized to Brodin and said, “unfortunately they scored.” That call resulted in the Kraken tying the game 2-2, which eventually ended in a 5-4, overtime loss for the Wild.
Ek returned to the game for one shift with a bubble mask after the elbow, but ended up leaving the game and is currently listed as day-to-day. With Ek’s absence, that has meant a lot of ice time for Kaprizov and Boldy, and it has showed to be draining. In the last three games, Kaprizov has averaged over 24 minutes of ice time, reaching 28 minutes in last night’s game. That is a lot of ice time for any player, let alone a forward, especially when Kaprizov’s average time on ice last season was 21 minutes and 35 seconds.
The injury bug has once again struck defenseman Jared Spurgeon, who is also listed as day-to-day with a lower-body injury. The injury must have occurred at some point in Saturday’s game, as Spurgeon has now missed the last two games. It is hard to see Spurgeon injured so early in the season as he only played 16 games last season due to shoulder, hip and back injuries. He underwent hip surgery in February, followed by back surgery just a month later. Hopefully this injury is nothing serious as last season showed the effects of missing one of their top defensemen drastically.
Gus Did What?!
Just when I thought the first week of the season could not have a more exciting finish, Gustavsson decided to score a goal... actually, a powerplay goal. This was the first of Gustavsson’s career at any level, the first in the Wild’s history and only the third time a goalie has scored a powerplay goal. Evgeni Nabokov and Martin Brodeur are the only other two goalies to do so.
During the timeout, Fleury suggested to Gustavsson that he should try and shoot at the empty net since the Wild were up two goals with just a few seconds left. So, after a Blues player dumped the puck in from across the blue line, Gustavsson caught the puck and launched it down the ice, bringing the final score to 4-1 over St. Louis.
ALL ABOARD THE GUS BUS
— Minnesota Wild (@mnwild) October 16, 2024
It's a GOALIE GOAL 🚨 pic.twitter.com/7lx14FyIfb
“I didn’t know I could shoot it that far in the air, so it’s great it got in there,” Gustavsson said in an interview after the game.
With all the goalie gear, shooting a puck down the ice like that is a lot harder than it looks, but Gus sure made it look easy even though he says he never really practices shooting.
“We had fun the other day, we just did some breakaways and I was allowed to shoot on the other net just to make it a game, but, uh, no, I usually don’t shoot it that much,” Gus said.
With that goal, Gus helped bring the Wild’s powerplay to 30.8% through 13 opportunities this season.
“I should be on the powerplay meetings now,” Gus joked in the interview after the game.
Gus now has more goals than Connor McDavid and Auston Matthews combined this season.
The Wild now have a much needed few days off to hopefully reset in time for the next game on Saturday against Columbus. That just marks game three of a seven game road trip they are currently on. After Saturday, they face the reigning Stanley Cup Champions, the Florida Panthers.
Kelly Rivard
Kelly is a Minnesota native and a proud Gopher alumna who enjoys making people laugh and spending time with family. Her skills include going 5/6 on parlays, managing multiple incredibly great (fantasy) sports teams and throwing 30 mph fastballs. When she’s not at the X, Target Field or US Bank Stadium cheering on her favorite teams, you can find her pouring drinks for customers at her hometown pub.
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