Game Preview: Minnesota Wild vs. Vancouver Canucks 3/25/2017 @ 1:00PM CST at Xcel Energy Center

Minnesota Wild (44-23-6)  94pts  2nd in the Central

3.19 Goals For Per Game (2nd in the NHL)

2.48 Goals Against Per Game (6th in the NHL)

21.1% Power Play (10th in the NHL)

83.9% Penalty Kill (8th in the NHL)

Top 5 Scorers:

1. #64 Mikael Granlund ~ 25G 41A = 66pts

2. #12 Eric Staal ~ 24G 32A = 56pts

3. #9 Mikko Koivu ~ 18G 35A = 53pts

4. #22 Nino Niederreiter ~ 20G 29A = 49pts

5. #3 Charlie Coyle ~ 17G 32A = 49pts

Top 3 PIM’s:

1. #7 Chris Stewart ~ 89 PIM’s

2. #21 Ryan White ~ 77 PIM’s

3. #24 Mathew Dumba ~ 57 PIM’s

Top Goaltenders:

1. #40 Devan Dubnyk (37-19-3)  2.17GAA  .927%SP  5SO

2. #35 Darcy Kuemper (7-4-3)  3.21GAA  .904%SP

Vs.

Vancouver Canucks (29-35-9)  67pts  6th in the Pacific

2.23 Goals For Per Game (29th in the NHL)

2.92 Goals Against Per Game (23rd in the NHL)

13.9% Power Play (28th in the NHL)

77.6% Penalty Kill (27th in the NHL)

Top 5 Scorers:

1. #53 Bo Horvat ~ 20G 27A = 47pts

2. #33 Henrik Sedin ~ 15G 30A = 45pts

3. #22 Daniel Sedin ~ 14G 26A = 40pts

4. #47 Sven Baertschi ~ 17G 16A = 33pts

5. #60 Markus Granlund ~ 19G 13A = 32pts

Top 3 PIM’s:

1. #88 Nikita Tryamkin ~ 56 PIM’s

2. #5 Luca Sbisa ~ 38 PIM’s

3. #15 Derek Dorsett ~ 33 PIM’s

Top Goaltenders:

1. #30 Ryan Miller (18-23-6)  2.79GAA  .915%SP  3SO

2. #25 Jacob Markstrom (10-11-3)  2.63GAA  .910%SP

Lines:

Vancouver Canucks

D. Sedin~H. Sedin~Mrk. Granlund

Baertschi~Horvat~Boucher

Labate~Sutter~Shore

Cramarossa~Chaput~Megna

Edler~Stecher

Sbisa~Tryamkin

Hutton~Biega

Miller

Markstrom

Minnesota Wild

Zucker-Koivu~Granlund

Parise~Staal~Coyle

Niederreiter~Hanzal~Pominville

Stewart~Haula~Schroeder

Suter~Spurgeon

Scandella~Dumba

Brodin~Folin

Dubnyk

Kuemper

Welcome to another day of “will they or won’t they.” Will the Minnesota Wild get their collective heads out of their behinds? Will they remember that they’re professionals? Will they finally clinch a playoff spot? The entire “will they, won’t they” issue reminds me of one of my favorite YouTube channels, “Good Mythical Morning.” On their channel, hosts Rhett and Link have a popular series called “Will It?” In this series, they take common foods like tacos, change them up with odd, sometimes non-food items, and then eat them and answer the question of “will it?” Their most recent installment was on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon just this week. They were exploring the idea of one of my favorite snacks, s’mores. Let’s just say, it wasn’t particularly successful, and that Fallon wasn’t able to stomach pretty much any of the combinations, except for the one that no one should really eat.

Adding to the question/problem of “will they or won’t they” for the Minnesota Wild, is again the “problem” of an early game in a back-to-back situation. At least today’s game is a matinee game. If this game was at 7pm (or even 5pm), tomorrow’s game at 11:30am (I hate you NBC) would be even more painful. Considering how painful this schedule has been, I’m surprised the league hasn’t found a way to make it even more painful. Seriously, I want to meet the person who created (or at least created the computer program that generated the schedule) and punch them in the face. Now, I’m not a violent person. I work in customer service and have a pretty thick skin and usually just shake my head at some of my more ridiculous customers. It’s pretty rare that a customer gets under my skin, but I had one of those this week. I managed to not lose it on the customer, but as soon as I got off that call, I had to step away from my desk and later in my shift, I had a one-on-one video call with my manager. However, this schedule reminds me of how I felt with that customer. You get that desire to strangle someone. And with how the Wild have been playing this month, it makes you feel even more violent about the schedule.

This afternoon’s game will most likely have a theme that has nothing to do with the Minnesota Wild. It’s probably a good thing this game is not being broadcast on NBC or NBCSN today. If it was, we’d get to hear Pierre McGuire blather on and on about the newest member of the Vancouver Canucks. Arriving at the hotel today, with the ink barely dry on his contract, is University of North Dakota standout Brock Boeser. With his college team eliminated from its regional playoff in a double overtime matchup with the Boston University, he was available to join the team that drafted him. The Canucks have the second worst offense in the league. When you’re that bad, signing and playing an NHL rookie in his very first professional game isn’t a risk. There’s nothing to lose in this situation for Vancouver. If this game was on NBC, we’d get to hear Pierre talk about random restaurants in the Grand Forks area while he waxes poetically on Boeser’s tenure with North Dakota. It will be bad enough hearing Anthony LaPanta and Mike Greenlay talk about him. And knowing the Wild’s history when facing teams dressing a player in their first NHL game, it could be brutal. Could someone kidnap Rhett and Link? I’d rather have two clueless hockey broadcasters who would be the first to admit that they don’t know what they’re doing than two clueless broadcasters who think they know what they’re doing. Remember, our broadcast duo was confusing Brian Strait and Mark Streit several times during last Sunday’s game against the Jets.

I will be missing all of today’s game. This is what happens when you work on Saturday’s and the game is early. Although considering how this team has been playing as of late, I doubt I’ll be missing much of anything. Not only do I know Minnesota’s ability to let rookie players on the opposing team shine, but I also know their ability to play like crap against teams that have no hopes of the playoffs. I expect this game to be ugly, and I’m highly considering turning off notifications from the NHL on my phone.