We’re back! It seems like ages ago since the Minnesota Wild were eliminated in the 1st round of the playoffs by the Dallas Stars. The loss forced the Wild to take a hard look at itself and make a bold change. A (mostly) new coaching staff and a new approach will be tested early as Minnesota takes on the hard charging St. Louis Blues who is in the midst of its own leadership transition as Ken Hitchcock is in his last year while Mike Yeo waits in the wings. Whether that will turn out to be a distraction or just be business as usual remains to be seen.
Minnesota wants to be seen as a contender as do the Blues. Sean McIndoe of Down Goes Brown wrote at the Hockey News of five teams whose Stanley Cup window may have closed where he mentions the Blues but not the Wild. Does that mean the Wild aren’t in the mix or is their Cup contending window still open? Tough to say, but the Wild might give us some clues as the face the Blues this evening. So which team looked more like a contender and which one looked like a pretender?
1st Period Thoughts: It was not the high energy period I think the Wild were hoping for. All too often throughout the period, the Wild looked a step too slow and too soft to really counteract the Blues’ speed. After the Wild’s Marco Scandella rang a shot off the post in the opening minute, the shots were very few and far between as the Blues kept Minnesota bottled up in its own end of the ice. The Wild managed just two shots on goal which isn’t nearly enough if they really want come away with 2 points tonight. The Blues were not creating a ton of high quality chances, but they were taking any chance to fire the puck on Devan Dubnyk. Colton Parayko was looking pretty dangerous for St. Louis. Minnesota’s best scoring chance came on the penalty kill when Jason Zucker knocked away a pass and then skated it down for a partial breakaway but his backhand bid was denied by the leg pad of Jake Allen. Yet the period belonged to the Blues who just kept swarming in the Wild’s zone, especially when Minnesota’s 4th line of Teemu Pulkkinen, Zac Dalpe and Jason Zucker were on the ice. This is where the Blues would break the stalemate when Mike Reilly, who was a turnover machine in the 1st would cough up the puck to Robby Fabbri who worked the puck towards the slot that was pounced on by Alex Steen who lifted a quick shot over Dubnyk’s shoulder. 1-0 Blues. Minnesota would get a chance on the power play and while they moved the puck quicker but most of the shots were coming from the perimeter. Eric Staal seemed to struggle with the speed of the game at even strength but I thought he looked ok on the power play and even showing a little initiative as he drove towards the middle of the ice from the boards for a nice wrist shot that missed just wide. The Wild are going to have to find another gear if they really want to compete against the Blues.
2nd Period Thoughts: The period was only marginally better. The start of it at least, but by the end of it was Minnesota playing rope-a-dope and just hanging on. Minnesota had some more jump, and that led to a goal as Ryan Suter decided to go on the forecheck, as he stripped Fabbri of the puck and then moved in all alone as Allen made the initial save and then he swept the puck into the yawning net. It was a great individual effort by Suter who stole the puck and then made a nice move on the goaltender which was something you’d expect to see from Zach Parise and not the defenseman. Minnesota would have some more golden chances as Eric Staal got a breakaway but his backhand to forehand move was denied. It drew a penalty but the power play was a mess. It reverted to the Mikko Koivu-Ryan Suter dominated fiasco of slow puck movement that culminated in a weak wrist shot from the point. As the period wore on, the Blues seemed to raise their physical intensity as Parayko took a nice run at Mikael Granlund that got the Scottrade Center crowd going. The Blues then went on the attack and it was Nail Yakupov skating just across the blueline and hammering a slap shot that beat Dubnyk. Yakupov’s shot did ramp off the stick of Jared Spurgeon but the angle wasn’t that extreme that Dubnyk couldn’t stop it as it trickled underneath his arm and in. Soft goal. 2-1 Blues. The Blues would pour it on late and the Wild looked like an overmatched pee-wee team as St. Louis outhustled, outmuscled and flat out wanted the Wild for loose pucks and the result was Dubnyk was resembling Slap Shot’s Denis Lemieux between the pipes. Ugly, but somehow the Wild escaped only being down by one. They were being outshot 24-10 to this point which is less one sided than it really was. Chris Stewart would try to stop some of the Blues hits by challenging Joel Edmonson to a fight, but he wouldn’t oblige and all he’d earn was a game misconduct. Ouch.
3rd Period Thoughts: The 3rd was another mixed effort. It started out with a decent power play, with good puck movement and the team trying to set up newcomer Teemu Pulkkinen in the slot. The 2nd half of the power play was mired with sloppy passing and lethargic effort to the puck. The Blues added what would be the game winner early in the 3rd as Magnus Paajarvi found a little space before beating Dubnyk way too easily with the backhander. 3-1 Blues. Minnesota would start to show a little push back as Boudreau immediately started juggling lines and it was clear the veterans were already in his doghouse. He repeatedly used a modified 4th line of Dalpe, Zucker and Coyle perhaps sending a message to the higher paid vets that they need to work harder. The line would reward Boudreau as Zucker would win a battle for the puck along the boards and he’d send a centering pass out near the goal that was pounced on by Coyle for a pretty finish. 3-2 game, but you got the sense it was too little too late even in the last 5 minutes of the game. Boudreau kept working the new modified 3rd and 4th lines while he saved the veterans for the last minute and half in the game. The veterans still looked a bit groggy and Minnesota was not able to generate much of anything with the extra attacker and the Blues would skate away with a 3-2 victory.
Dubnyk was sub-par, giving up at least 2 soft goals on 31 shots. The soft goals deflated the Wild long enough that they ran out of time to successfully mount a comeback. Defensively it was a rough night for Mike Reilly who looked confused and frazzled as he coughed up pucks with little pressure on him. I thought Brodin was unimpressive too and his foolish penalty late in the 2nd nearly resulted in a power play goal for the Blues. The penalty kill was perfect, but at times the effort was more scrambling as opposed to being stifling.
Offensively the Wild were not moving their feet and waiting for pucks to come to them instead of skating to them. Jason Zucker was the most consistent forward for me this evening and his assist was created because of good effort and using his speed to apply pressure and get behind the Blues defense. The inability to convert breakaway chances certainly played a role in the outcome in this game, but Minnesota probably didn’t deserve that kind of good fortune.
The effort in this game is probably what was most disappointing as the Wild were thoroughly outworked by the Blues even though they had played the night before. Sure it was the Blues’ home opener but the Wild should’ve shown more jump to their skates than what they gave. Hopefully the club looks more motivated when they play the Jets on Saturday.
Wild Notes:
~ The Wild roster was as follows: Mikko Koivu, Mikael Granlund, Jason Pominville, Eric Staal, Zach Parise, Charlie Coyle, Nino Niederreiter, Jason Zucker, Chris Stewart, Erik Haula, Teemu Pulkkinen, Zac Dalpe, Ryan Suter, Jared Spurgeon, Marco Scandella, Mathew Dumba, Jonas Brodin and Mike Reilly. Darcy Kuemper backed up Devan Dubnyk. Nate Prosser and Christian Folin were the healthy scratches.
~ The 3 Stars of the Game were: 1st Star Nail Yakpuov, 2nd Star Christian Berglund, 3rd Star Colton Parayko
~ Attendance was 19,673 at Scottrade Center.
~ Eric Staal wore #12, joining Matt Johnson, Brian Rolston, Craig Weller, Chuck Kobasew and David Jones having worn the number.
~ Chris Stewart wore #7 joining Cliff Ronning, Erik Westrum, Clayton Stoner, Matt Cullen, Jonathan Blum, Chris Porter having worn the number.
~ Teemu Pulkkinen wore #17 joining Filip Kuba, Wyatt Smith, Todd Fedoruk, Petr Sykora, Casey Wellman, Nick Palmieri and Torrey Mitchell having worn the number.
Wild Prospect Report:
C – Dmitry Sokolov (Sudbury, OHL) ~ No one could say it was for a lack of trying that the Wild prospect only ended up with one goal as he registered 10 shots on goal in Sudbury’s 5-4 loss to Niagara on Sunday. Sokolov’s tally was the the 1st of his 2016-17 season.
LW – Kirill Kaprizov (Ufa Salavayev, KHL) ~ the shifty Russian is trying to build on a strong campaign where he was one of the top rookies in the KHL. Kaprizov is off to an ok start with 3 goals, 7 points, 33 PIM’s and is a +1 in 15 games played.
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