CreaseAndAssist

16 hours ago, Alexandron said:

Thanks for posting that info. For me present the most interest Riley Heidt who is impressing me with his persistent production for Prince George team : 2 seasons ago he had 58 points, last season 97; and this season in 60 played games he has already 107 points (34 goals, 73 assists; +/- +29).

(shrugs)  We've seen stories like this before.  See Adam Beckman.  Sure, we're all hopeful this isn't just junior league domination...but it's best to not buy too heavily into this.  If he ends up scoring at a point per game pace in the AHL after the conclusion of his junior season then you have something to get excited about.  

I saw a ton of posts on Twitter where they suggested John Hynes do the Sam Cassell big balls dance, but I'm thinking why?  The Wild are desperate, clearly...it's only a shame that if you pull that goaltender in 3-on-3 that if you win it denies the other team the loser point.  That might end up making more 3-on-3 OT's near the end of the season interesting if that's a rule change.  

On 3/9/2024 at 1:11 PM, IllaZilla said:

Well if you want to take it a step further, what was the rush signing all those players before the off season? It’s not like they’re up and coming rookies or high end scorers.  They’re all pluggers, with the exception of Zuccarello. With the crappy seasons they’ve all had, he probably could have gotten them for half of what he paid. 

I said that right after it happened.  

50:10 in the podcast (sorry there is a lot of background noise)

I said this on Oct. 8th.  And another friend Tom pointed out even when cap hell ends, the big space some expect won't really exist as you will have to start issuing raises to other young players.  

Luke Toporowski, the first Iowa-native to play for the Iowa Wild has done pretty well.  A goal and an assist in two games so far.  Caeden Bankier had a decent weekend too.  

Reiger Lorenz, Riley Heidt, Kalem Parker, Aaron Pionk, Hunter Haight and Rasmus Kumpulainen all registered points over the weekend.  

While Brodin has a goal today, he's bailed on his coverage in his own end a few times.  I am listening to the Iowa game as I watch Minnesota.  Iowa is up 5-2 in the 3rd period.  Bankier has had a good weekend, Iowa still mostly is crap.  Although Toporowski became the first Iowa-native to play for the team and so far he has two points in two games.  

I think Fleury has been working hard, and had has had to clear a lot of rebounds away by himself.  

Episode #36: Trader Bill and the State Tournament

We discuss the #mnwild trade deadline day moves, we also discuss the state tournament and answer listener questions too.  Lastly, @MNSOTA talks about the travesty that is the DIv-III Men's & Women's hockey brackets / tournaments.  

Kirill seems to be playing more like his 100% self.  Creating plays, showing more initiative to score.  Had some great opportunities but he just couldn't bury them.  But he was still pretty dangerous out there.  I still feel he's much more direct with Eriksson Ek as his linemate instead of pass-happy Zuccarello.  

A Tony Tuzzolini trade as @Fargocase used to say.  We trade a better veteran 'ringer' for a worse one.  But he (Turner Elson) must have 'character' since he's been an alternate captain for quite a while now...points not so much anymore.  

16 hours ago, IllaZilla said:

He had to give them the NTC/NMC because of the dead cap space. He couldn’t give them as much as other teams salary-wise. So to compensate he throws in the NTC/NMC. 
 

Maybe if the team had stayed healthy all season long they might have made the Playoffs. Hard to say what they would have done. I don’t think they would have done much. But that’s just me. 

I don't think it was absolutely necessary to hand out NMC's / NTC's to these players.  That's just his idea of courtesy and because of that courtesy they squandered the opportunity to make more lucrative deals.  Either way, he probably did about as well as could be expected, albeit a bunch of mid-draft selections in 2026.  

@MNSOTA and I will talk about this more in our podcast we're recording this afternoon.  

We struggled to win against an Arizona team that is pretty much waiting for another season to end.  I just can't get excited about that.  It looks like (knock on wood) we'll have two 30-goal scorers this season with Kaprizov netting #30 and Eriksson Ek his 29th.  There's that...but the team has to literally win just about every game to have even a chance.  It's not worth it.  

No trade protection on the Zach Bogosian extension.  However, the chart also shows that Wild employ the NTC / NMC bonus more than most of the rest of the league does.  And no team has more NMC's than the Wild do.  I wish I had this chart a few months ago; as I gathered this information just picking my way through Cap Friendly.  

With Colorado likely to be a contender, the 3rd round pick will be pretty late (so its just about a 4th round pick).  It sure would've been nice before we cemented in a bunch of 30-ish year old players to take advantage of other teams wanting to overpay for marginal talent but instead we hold onto it like grim death because they tell our GM "I like it here."  

This was a pretty sad game to watch overall.  Both Gustavsson and Kahkonen were giving up soft goals.  The Wild made this game tough for themselves.  Faber's turnover to Duclair was brutal.  Sure people will fixate on Kaprizov's hat trick...which is always fun but we made that game a lot harder than it had to be.  

I must admit, I'm not sure why some people felt Nico Sturm wouldn't fit as a 4th line center on this team.  

Iowa Wild lost 6-3 tonight to Rockford.  They went 1-2 against Rockford who stands right in front of the in the AHL Central Division standings.  Adam Beckman had a goal.  So his relative 'hot' streak continues.  Beyond that...not much to say about it.  

Riley Heidt gets to a 100 points with Prince George.  

Rieger Lorenz bagged his 9th goal of the season with Denver.  

Aaron Pionk and Jack Peart each had an assist with UMD and SCSU respectively.  

Servac Petrovsky had a goal and an assist with Owen Sound.  

Minnesota Wild (28-25-6)  62pts  6th in the Central

3.14 Goals For Per Game (15th in the NHL)

3.29 Goals Against Per Game (22nd in the NHL)

22.2% Power Play (13th in the NHL)

74.6% Penalty Kill (29th in the NHL)

Top 5 Scorers:

1. #97 Kirill Kaprizov ~ 26G 37A = 63pts

2. #14 Joel Eriksson Ek ~ 28G 26A = 54pts

3. #36 Mats Zuccarello ~ 11G 39A = 50pts

4. #12 Matt Boldy ~ 23G 24A = 47pts

5. #7 Brock Faber ~ 4G 30A = 34pts

Top 3 PIM's:

1. #21 Brandon Duhaime ~ 66 PIM's

2. #5 Jake Middleton ~ 63 PIM's

3. #14 Joel Eriksson Ek ~ 48 PIM's

Top Goaltenders:

1. #32 Filip Gustavsson (16-14-3)  3.23GAA  .896%  2SO

2. #29 Marc-Andre Fleury (12-10-3)  2.92GAA  .899%  1SO

Vs.

Nashville Predators (33-25-2)  68pts  4th in the Central

3.10 Goals For Per Game (17th in the NHL)

3.13 Goals Against Per Game (17th in the NHL)

18.8% Power Play (21st in the NHL)

75.7% Penalty Kill (27th in the NHL)

Top 5 Scorers:

1. #9 Filip Forsberg ~ 28G 32A = 60pts

2. #59 Roman Josi ~ 14G 43A = 57pts

3. #90 Ryan O'Reilly ~ 20G 29A = 49pts

4. #14 Gustav Nyquist ~ 16G 33A = 49pts

5. #82 Tommy Novak ~ 12G 20A = 32pts

Top 3 PIM's:

1. #47 Michael McCarron ~ 82 PIM's

2. #3 Jeremy Lauzon ~ 81 PIM's

3. #36 Cole Smith ~ 56 PIM's

Top Goaltenders:

1. #74 Juuse Saros (24-21-2)  2.91GAA  .905%  2SO

2. #32 Kevin Lankinen (8-4-0)  3.23GAA  .892%

Lines:

Nashville Predators

F. Forsberg-R. O'Reilly~Nyquist

Trenin~Sissons~Glass

Jankowski~Novak~Evangelista

Co. Smith~McCarron~Sherwood

Josi~Fabbro

McDonagh~L. Schenn

Lauzon~A. Carrier

Saros

Lankinen

Minnesota Wild

Kaprizov~Eriksson Ek~Boldy

M. Johansson~Rossi~Zuccarello

Duhaime~Dewar~Hartman

Lucchini~Gaudreau~Lettieri

Middleton~Faber

Brodin~Chisholm

Merrill~Bogosian

Gustavsson

Fleury

Pretty evenly matched...at least statistically speaking.  But a big game for this club.  

Iowa lost 3-2 in OT against Grand Rapids last night.  Bankier and Raska with the goals for Iowa.  If Iowa making the playoffs is a priority with this organization, they certainly could use Mason Shaw if the Minnesota Wild seem to have no plans to use him.   

Friedman: Minnesota Wild have told teams they are not trading Marc-Andre Fleury.  (shrugs)  It was always his call to begin with since he has a NMC.  Now adding Khusnutdinov, other then selling a bit and maybe weaponizing cap space I think it will be a quiet deadline again.  

Not that it should really be that active (unless we had a firesale which we can't since we've chained up most of the roster) anyways.  

Either way, last night's game against Carolina shows the conundrum they are in.  They can go 7-1-1, but you lose once you end up losing ground because those ahead of you keep winning.  One step forward, two steps back...

For all of the ways when Minnesota found a way to win against Edmonton, Seattle and Vancouver before that.  They found a way to lose against Carolina.  A lazy shift at the end of the 2nd period led to a game-tying goal.  While Chisholm moves the puck well; he is not the most responsible defender.  

Toss in Kaprizov and Eriksson Ek being held scoreless and you have another loss.  A missed opportunity indeed.  

Oh and since someone wants to talk about PWHL team.  Watched the end of that one too.  Minnesota has no clue what to do during 3-on-3 overtime.  They seem to think it's some kind of 1-on-1 contest.  As much as I loathe the current 3-on-3 style of waiting and weaving that the NHL / AHL employs it really is the smartest strategy.  The solo attack is what we used to see in the Parise / Suter days...and they get caught extending their shifts and it gives the opposing team an easy 2-on-1 or 3-on-1...and you get burned.  

It's been pretty ugly this year that's for sure.  They really missed Andy Welinski, until they picked up Will Butcher.  Now Welinski and Butcher are there.  But the kids make a lot of mistakes with the puck.  

Yurov yes.  Khusnutdinov is projecting as more of a middle six to bottom six kind of player.  My guess is they feel they can save some money here.  Albeit not a lot.  Another place where it would've been nice if they would've been able to clear out some older players here...but they liked it here and thus were cemented in with a No Movement Clause.  

John Hynes told reporters that Joel Eriksson Ek is fine in case anyone missed it.  

Speaking of tanking...anyone see how Iowa's week went?  1-3; all against divisional opponents.  Yesterday they squandered a 3-0 lead against Chicago to lose 4-3 in OT.  

Zuccarello with a 4-point night.  As long as the Wild's best players play like this...it makes a lot of things a lot easier.  I thought Declan Chisholm had another good game.  It's a good win on the 2nd half of a back-to-back this team has to have if it wants to climb back into the playoff picture.  

Didn't like the hit Eriksson Ek took late in the game by Will Borgen.  Hopefully he's just a little sore; because he's irreplaceable IMO.  

Episode #35: Iowa, We Have a Problem

In this episode, @MNSOTA and I discuss the Iowa Wild's struggles and whether or not that should matter to the Minnesota Wild.  We also discuss Mason Shaw and who he may replace in the lineup whenever he gets his chance and whether or not the team will be a buyer at the trade deadline.  Check it out!  

I didn't think the Wild played too bad to be honest.  I thought Boldy was about as engaged as we've seen all season.  The top line continues to really make things happen for the Wild.  I thought Chisholm had a better game although he has a penchant for taking penalties when he gets caught defensively.  Brodin seems to be gaining more confidence and chipping in more offensively.  A better than expected showing IMO.