Minnesota Wild (14-9-1) 29pts 5th in the Central
2.75 Goals For (13th)
2.29 Goals Against (7th)
9% Power Play (29th)
88.9% Penalty Kill (2nd)
Top 5 Scorers:
1. #11 Zach Parise ~ 9G 10A = 19pts
2. #29 Jason Pominville ~ 5G 11A = 16pts
3. #22 Nino Niederreiter ~ 11G 3A = 14pts
4. #26 Thomas Vanek ~ 2G 12A = 14pts
5. #16 Jason Zucker ~ 10G 3A = 13pts
Top 3 PIM’s:
1. #6 Marco Scandella ~ 34 PIM’s
2. #18 Ryan Carter ~ 22 PIM’s
3. #2 Keith Ballard ~ 21 PIM’s
Top Goaltenders:
1. #35 Darcy Kuemper (11-7-0) 2.28GAA .912%SP 3SO
2. #32 Niklas Backstrom (3-2-1) 2.01GAA .915%SP
Vs.
Anaheim Ducks (16-6-5) 37pts 2nd in the Pacific
2.67 Goals For (15th)
2.56 Goals Against (13th)
17% Power Play (21st)
83.9% Penalty Kill (10th)
Top 5 Scorers:
1. #15 Ryan Getzlaf ~ 8G 17A = 25pts
2. #10 Corey Perry ~ 14G 8A = 22pts
3. #45 Sami Vatanen ~ 7G 14A = 21pts
4. #17 Ryan Kesler ~ 6G 12A = 18pts
5. #39 Matt Beleskey ~ 12G 2A = 14pts
Top 3 PIM’s:
1. #18 Tim Jackman ~ 44 PIM’s
2. #17 Ryan Kesler ~ 34 PIM’s
3. #10 Corey Perry ~ 33 PIM’s
Top Goaltenders:
1. #31 Frederik Andersen (12-4-4) 2.43GAA .915%SP 1SO
2. #36 John Gibson (2-2-0) 2.28GAA .927%SP 1SO
3. #30 Jason LaBarbera (2-0-1) 2.61GAA .909%SP
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YkuS94tD6EE]Towards the latter half of Wednesday night’s game against the Montreal Canadiens I was starting to feel a greater feeling of frustration as the Wild went through a whole 5-minute power play without registering a single shot on goal. It was pathetic and embarrassing, and the home crowd was not happy as it spent most of the 5-minute power play boo’ing their own club despite the team holding a 2-0 lead at that point. The broadcast duo of Anthony LaPanta and Mike Greenlay made light of the fan’s frustration and how they felt it was a bit ludicrous to be mad at a team that was leading and dominating much of the play up to that point. After the game Wild Head Coach Mike Yeo told reporters, “It’s up to me to figure out how to deal with it, it’s up to me to correct it, everyone’s frustrated. Fans are frustrated. But trust me, I’d be willing to bet they’re not as frustrated as we are. It will get better.” It was at that point I asked myself, what would Jacques Lemaire have done? I looked on YouTube for some Lemaire quotes and found this clip made by a friend of mine which was full of classic Jacques moments.
Instead of trying to pile it on with cliches, and try to glaze over the fact the team’s power play seemed to be doing all it could to set up Jason Pominville for shots on goal, Lemaire would’ve been direct and identified the problem. Just go to the 1:39 mark on the video for his simple response to a question posed by a reporter. Do we hear that kind of honesty anymore? Or are we too concerned with making a player / team feel uncomfortable. I miss that honesty and simple accountability. The team was forcing plays that were not there and even when pucks made it over to Pominville most of the time all he could manage was to fan on it and the team squandered opportunity after opportunity to put the game away. So instead of just making it a 3-0 or 4-0 win the team had to scramble just to eek out a 2-1 victory.
I tweeted about my frustration and even gave a little criticism to Mike Greenlay (his twitter handle is @PulledGoalie) about complaining about the boo’ing fans. I am @StateofHckyNews by the way. Just read the tweets for yourself starting with my original tweet.
@ State of Hockey News – #mnwild I love when @PulledGoalie questions why we boo, we boo because we know the game, and we know a crap power play when we see it.
He responded…
The Ducks are one of the top teams in the Pacific Division. The Wild must be much better than they were Wednesday night if they want to earn another victory. I think the Wild certainly play better at home; but Wednesday’s game almost smacked of a team being ‘too comfortable’ in front of the friendly confines of Xcel Energy Center and whether it takes boo’s or more pressure via social media to get them to stay focused then I’m more than happy to do my part either way. Having higher expectations of this squad is part of having a team in the State of Hockey. We know the game, don’t try to tell us Wednesday’s effort was your best because we all know it wasn’t even close.
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