Marcus Johansson Pushes Wild Past Golden Knights

That's Wild

• The Minnesota Wild returned from their holiday break to travel to Nevada and face the Vegas Golden Knights. While their familiar foe has not been having some perfect season, they are still a very good team and would provide a strong test for Minnesota. And thanks to Marcus Johansson scoring four points and the Wild taking advantage of their chances to even run Carter Hart off the ice, Minnesota claimed a 5-2 victory before they head out to California. [StarTribune]
• Before the game, head coach John Hynes juggled his lineup to try and get the most out of them. It looked like it worked. [Pioneer Press]
• One number that will tell us whether or not Quinn Hughes is going to re-sign with the Wild this summer. [Hockey Wilderness]
• Matt Boldy is breaking out and truly closing the gap between him and Kirill Kaprizov as the team's top forward. [Hockey Wilderness]

Off the trail...

• The Carolina Hurricanes get some bad, bad news. Their goaltender Pyotr Kochetkov is likely out for the entire season as he's preparing for surgery to heal a lower-body injury that has been nagging him all year. [NHL.com]
• Are the Buffalo Sabres ever going to lose again? They continued their winning streak through the holiday break and after stomping all over the St. Louis Blues, they have now won nine straight games. [TheScore]
• Why the Oilers and Andrew Mangiapane could be heading to a separation just months after he signed a two-year contract. [Edmonton Journal]
• A big list of bold predictions for the hockey world in 2026, and one of them involves the Toronto Maple Leafs blowing everything up. [Sportsnet]