Clay Gregory Provisional Member Posted October 16 Share Posted October 16 View full article Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Amaddeo Verified Member Posted October 16 Share Posted October 16 My thoughts are mixed through 4 games this season. However, I will say that against Winnipeg and St. Louis when there were long stretches hemmed in their end, the Wild didn’t bend and take a penalty. They played a tidy defensive game and didn’t give many high danger chances up (more in Winnipeg, but overall, clean defense). So, those games were both encouraging. And Gus has looked excellent so far. Surely he will regress, but no reason to think he can’t maintain a .920 save percentage. That should be more than enough to provide this team with the goaltending needed to make the playoffs. I think the defense will be okay. The game in Seattle was definitely a bit of an outlier so far. They’ve maintained discipline and have been pretty tidy in their own end, so I have faith in Hynes getting players to be adaptable and buy into his system. Would still like to see another top 6 forward and a top 4 RD because of Spurge’s health. But I think Hunt looked great in his limited time last night. Chisholm also looked good. I think he these guys should get more ice time over Bogo and Merrill, but maybe it’s just me. 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sam Verified Member Posted October 17 Share Posted October 17 I would consider myself a Minnesota Wild faithful and I’m not frustrated or upset. We are in a better spot in the standings than we were last year. It is a little frustrating how good Dallas seems to be however. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
1Brotherbill Verified Member Posted October 17 Share Posted October 17 2 and 2 isn't bad. A point in each game even better. Only two points dropped in 4 games fantastic. All that being said I would seriously wait until Nov 6th before we start assessing the season and how well the team is playing versus how good we think they are. Between now and the 6th they Wild play Tampa twice, Florida, Pittsburgh, LA, Philadelphia and Columbus. They should beat most of the teams in that stretch and have a chance in all of the games. If they keep pace with what they have already done they should come out of this stretch of games with 16 or 17 points. That would still be on pace for around 82 points for the season. Which would probably not make the playoffs. The wild have the 6th best record in the league and are 5th in the west with Colorado, Edmonton, Nashville, and Vancouver not playing up to their potential. Basically the Wild need to pick up the pace on this road trip or they will be left behind again. 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hydguy75 Verified Member Posted October 17 Share Posted October 17 They say the best defense is a strong offense. In the Blues game, the Wild seemed to play assertively as a team. The offense passed the puck a lot, maintaining zone possession, hence relieving some pressure off the defense. They also only had 1 penalty in that game, which helps when you're not up against 5-4 or even 5-3. The Wild are already playing 2 lesser players due to this crazy Parise-Suter contract buyouts (which I still don't understand if the NHL now banned these long contracts, why are they still counted against the Wild cap?), so every edge they can muster, is a benefit. It was a good example of what they are capable of doing....now more consistency. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Imyourhuckleberry Verified Member Posted October 17 Share Posted October 17 10 hours ago, 1Brotherbill said: Between now and the 6th, the Wild play Tampa twice, Florida, Pittsburgh, LA, Philadelphia and Columbus. They should beat most of the teams in that stretch and have a chance in all of the games. If they keep pace with what they have already done they should come out of this stretch of games with 16 or 17 points. That would still be on pace for around 82 points for the season. Which would probably not make the playoffs. 16 points through 12 games would be on pace for 109 standings points, which would definitely make the playoffs. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Patrick Verified Member Posted October 17 Share Posted October 17 AI. Doesn't anyone review articles before they publish. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MacGyver Verified Member Posted October 17 Share Posted October 17 How can we possibly be projecting trends and required points to make the playoffs already?? Take a breath folks, lets let it settle in a bit. Maybe 20 25 games? At least. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FredJohnson Verified Member Posted October 17 Share Posted October 17 Are the AveNots tanking for next year's #1 overall pick?! 0-4-0 with last 3 games at home no less! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
B1GKappa97 Verified Member Posted October 17 Share Posted October 17 (edited) Quote With Minnesota's slow start, we must be conscious of small sample sizes Slow start? They haven't lost in regulation and have points from every game!! If we kept that up all season we'd probably win the presidents trophy rofl. Edited October 17 by B1GKappa97 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pewterschmidt Verified Member Posted October 17 Share Posted October 17 36 minutes ago, B1GKappa97 said: Slow start? They haven't lost in regulation and have points from every game!! If we kept that up all season we'd probably win the presidents trophy rofl. I think slow start refers less to the loser pts we got in the standings (against middling competition) and more about the yard sale hockey we saw on the ice. The team looked more 'effective' and 'organized' against STL so I'm hoping the first three games were just shaking off the rust. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MNCountryLife Verified Member Posted October 17 Share Posted October 17 5 hours ago, FredJohnson said: Are the AveNots tanking for next year's #1 overall pick?! 0-4-0 with last 3 games at home no less! That would shock me. I don't see players like Makar or McKinnon giving a rats tail about a high draft pick. Those guys believe they can win today....and they can. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FredJohnson Verified Member Posted October 17 Share Posted October 17 3 hours ago, MNCountryLife said: That would shock me. I don't see players like Makar or McKinnon giving a rats tail about a high draft pick. Those guys believe they can win today....and they can. I should have said I am being sarcastic. They have some climbing to do. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Protec Verified Member Posted October 18 Share Posted October 18 10 hours ago, FredJohnson said: Are the AveNots tanking for next year's #1 overall pick?! 0-4-0 with last 3 games at home no less! Bednar is such a goofball. He should focus more on his team, less on his GQ-Mens Health style. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mateo3xm Verified Member Posted October 18 Share Posted October 18 I thought ppl would find this interesting it’s from the athletic. Mn Wild 2024-2025 30th in weight at 196.1 lbs 30th in height at 72.7in 9th in age at 29 30th most Canadian players with 27.3% (We have the highest amount of European players by percentage in the entire NHL We have the 14th most first round picks on the team(teams above us are mostly all rebuilding such as Buffalo, Ana, Phi. 42.6% of all nhlers are first round picks. 46.1% of the rest are 2nd plus rounders and 11.3% are undrafted. Very interesting stuff. Kind of shows how important those first rounders are. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mateo3xm Verified Member Posted October 18 Share Posted October 18 On 10/17/2024 at 4:27 AM, hydguy75 said: They say the best defense is a strong offense. In the Blues game, the Wild seemed to play assertively as a team. The offense passed the puck a lot, maintaining zone possession, hence relieving some pressure off the defense. They also only had 1 penalty in that game, which helps when you're not up against 5-4 or even 5-3. The Wild are already playing 2 lesser players due to this crazy Parise-Suter contract buyouts (which I still don't understand if the NHL now banned these long contracts, why are they still counted against the Wild cap?), so every edge they can muster, is a benefit. It was a good example of what they are capable of doing....now more consistency. I think you may have that switched around. The best offense is a strong defense. It’s also been said that defense wins championships. It’s also been said that offense wins games but defense wins championships. I honestly think Edm lost last year because their defense played above how good they actually were. They seemed to hit a point were they couldn’t sustain that anymore. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mateo3xm Verified Member Posted October 18 Share Posted October 18 22 hours ago, B1GKappa97 said: Slow start? They haven't lost in regulation and have points from every game!! If we kept that up all season we'd probably win the presidents trophy rofl. Winning the presidents trophy doesn’t mean much. Only 8 out of the last 36 teams that have won the presidents trophy have gone on to win the Cup. Last time was the blackhawks in 12-13. We are far from that team. Regular season doesn’t mean a whole lot, how we play in the playoffs means everything. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Protec Verified Member Posted October 18 Share Posted October 18 Thanksgiving is the first benchmark. Let's see what the teams and standings look like then. MN has not had a total cupcake-schedule so far. They are getting some goals and good goaltending. CBJ has been pretty okay so far. Should be a good game coming up. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Up North Guy Verified Member Posted October 18 Share Posted October 18 5 hours ago, Protec said: Thanksgiving is the first benchmark. Let's see what the teams and standings look like then. MN has not had a total cupcake-schedule so far. They are getting some goals and good goaltending. CBJ has been pretty okay so far. Should be a good game coming up. Columbus has been a surprise so far. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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