Noon Number for 10-17-2013: 31

Hello, Wilderness!

For today's number I've decided to follow the footsteps of Ger and keep going with a penalty-related number, and that number is 31.

This is the number of power play opportunities that the Wild have got this season thus far. For those of you that don't know, they have the 2nd most PP opportunities in the NHL as of right now, only trailing just behind the 32 of the Hurricanes (we have our first of 2 meetings with them a week from today; I'll be going to that game too!).

Well great, we've had a decent amount of chances on the power play, but how about cashing in on them?

This is where things don't quite match up.

Despite having this high number of power play chances, the Wild have only had just a 29% success rate of scoring PPGs.

During our first few games of the season, our power play units looked decent.

Lately though, they haven't been able to capitalize on it.

Sure, they've been able to get the shots on net, but those don't mean a thing unless they lead to a goal.

In their game on Tuesday night against the Maple Leafs, they had 6 chances on the power play, but were only able to score on one of them (it was also the only goal of the game for them).

That means that the Wild were averaged a measly 17% on the power play that night. Ouch.

If the Wild want to have a fighting chance in any game, they have to find a way to score on these extra-man opportunities. They absolutely can't let these chances pass them by.