The Wild Are Suffering From A Little Freezer Burn

Upon his return from injury on Wednesday, Kirill Kaprizov’s teammates said they missed his smile.

“It’s really good to have him back,” Kaprizov’s Norwegian bestie, Mats Zuccarello, said after seeing him after Wednesday’s practice. “We all miss his smile, that beautiful smile, and you know … his positivity.”

Kaprizov and Zuccarello might be the only couple that can hop on a tandem bicycle and not have the ride end in a rancid divorce. However, Minnesota’s flaccid performance against the aptly-named Utah Hockey Squad made the Xcel Energy Center crowd pinch their noses on Thursday and turned the players’ smiles upside down.

“We just didn’t have an answer today to be honest with you, and it’s real frustrating,” winger Zuccarello said after Utah beat the Wild 4-0 in St. Paul. “It’s not good enough. I don’t think anyone’s happy.”

Kaprizov last played against the Chicago Blackhawks on Dec. 23 and missed 12 games with a lower-body injury. Jared Spurgeon also returned after Zachary L’Heureux slew-footed him in the Nashville Predators game on Dec. 31. 

Spurgeon and Kaprizov joined a hospital ward full of injured Wild players that includes Jonas Brodin and Marcus Johansson. Still, the short-handed Wild have been resilient. They beat the Dallas Stars in overtime after losing Kaprizov against Chicago and went on a five-game win streak after L’Heureux injured Spurgeon.

However, the Colorado Avalanche beat the Wild 6-1 to end their winning streak. They lost four of their next five games, with their lone win coming in San Jose. Minnesota’s lone win in their last five games was over the Avs, which is appropriately random for a team that lacks direction this season.

The Wild are 11-1-1 at home and 17-5-3 away from the X. They beat Paul Fenton and the defending champion Florida Panthers 5-1 earlier in the season; Fenton’s felines beat them 6-1 in mid-December. 

Last year, the Edmonton Oilers represented the Western Conference in the Stanley Cup Finals. Minnesota beat them 5-3 in Edmonton earlier this year, but the Oilers have beaten the Wild twice in St. Paul by a combined score of 12-4. 

The only consistent with the Wild is they’ve had some trouble against the West’s best teams.

• The Winnipeg Jets have beaten Minnesota twice: 2-1 in overtime and 5-0 in December in the game before Kaprizov suffered his injury against Chicago.
• The Vegas Golden Knights beat the Wild 3-2 in December and 4-1 in January.
• Minnesota has split 1-1 with Dallas and Colorado.
• Kevin Fiala and the Los Angeles Kings beat them twice by a combined 7-2 score.

Eventually, the Wild’s best players may be able to remove the ice bags and return to our ice. Still, this team seems the same regardless of who suits up. They’re talented but inconsistent. Entertaining but erratic. Resilient but hardly relentless.

The Wild are developing freezer burn because they haven’t been out of the first round since the 2014-15 season. They can be fun on any given night. However, like that pizza in the back of your fridge, you don’t know what you’ll get once things heat up. 

Perhaps they’ll be just fine. They might even catch fire. However, more likely than not, they’ll continue to smell a little funky and make you wince when you open the box.