Stalock Huge in 4-2 Wild Victory Over Calgary

The Hockey News just introduced a special issue where they recognized the Top 50 players for each of the league’s 30 teams (sorry Las Vegas, its too soon).  Even the Wild’s history made naming a Top 50 tough for THN‘s Ryan Kennedy but I thought he did a reasonable job of selecting players that represented the entire history of the 17-year old NHL franchise.  At #4 was current goaltender Devan Dubnyk, which is probably a deserving nod until you take into account to how things have gone so far this season.  Dubnyk is off to a rough 1-2-1 start with an ugly 3.80 goals against average.  While he’s expected to watch this game from the bench, the team needs him to be better if they really want to contend for the playoffs this season as the club sits at the bottom of the Central Division.

The Flames are having a decent start to the 2017-18 season, but that’s expected after the team made big moves to boost an already solid defensive corps as well as adding another goaltender.  It will be another tough road test for the injury-ravaged squad, can Minnesota earn a much-needed victory at the Red Mile?

1st Period Thoughts:  The 1st period started off with Mikko Koivu taking a tripping penalty just 45 seconds into the game.  Minnesota then spent the next 2 minutes scrambling about its own end, while the Wild’s zone resembled a shooting gallery and Alex Stalock had to bail his team out with save after save.  Daniel Winnik and Matt Cullen just couldn’t seem to clear the zone to save their lives.  The Flames were buzzing early and Sean Monahan and Mikael Backlund were denied by great stops by Stalock.  The Wild did not have too many chance of their own.  Even on the power play, the Wild seemed to struggle to connect and they were only able to funnel a few weak shots from the point that didn’t really threaten Mike Smith at all.  Even when they set up Marcus Foligno in the slot he’d hammer a shot wide of the net.  Defensively the Wild still look like a discombobulated mess; where the team will get caught having two defenders taking one man while they leave another wide open.  Mathew Dumba looked pretty uninspired in their own end and he needs to pick up his focus.  Fortunately Stalock was sharp and he’d help make up for these mistakes.  Minnesota would eventually create a few chances of their own, mostly due to the tremendous hustle of Jason Zucker who was one of the few Wild players who seemed to have some jump in his skates.  Zucker had the best scoring chance of the period as Chris Stewart fed a puck out front that Zucker pushed just wide.  The Flames even flirted with giving the Wild a gift as Smith fanned on a pass with Luke Kunin racing in on the forecheck and his puck went out to the oncoming Minnesota forward but instead of tapping it into the open goal he fanned on the biscuit.  The Wild were outshot 18-8 and that was a fair reflection of how one-sided that period really was.

2nd Period Thoughts:  Overall a much better period for the Minnesota Wild with a caveat I’ll get to a little bit later.  Minnesota was far more controlled defensively, limiting the Flames scoring chances and spending less time scrambling around its own end like it did in the 1st period.  This also meant Stalock wasn’t forced to do his best Denis Lemieux impression over again.  The Wild would get a rare two-man advantage early in the period.  On the power play the Wild puck movement was pretty routine and too slow to really loosen up Calgary’s penalty killer who were staying in a fairly tight diamond around Mike Smith.  The only player that seemed to have permission to pull the trigger was Ryan Suter who would occasionally blast a slap shot well wide of the goal.  I am not sure why they wanted Suter to take the shot instead of Mathew Dumba who has a more dangerous slapper.  Fortunately the team switched up its power play and they’d cash in as Chris Stewart followed up his own shot as he battled the rebound out of the air to light the lamp to give the Wild a 1-0 lead.  The goal silenced the sellout Calgary crowd and Minnesota would go into lockdown mode.  The Wild still occasionally threatened offensively as Zucker had a pretty little chance where he tried to bank a shot off of Smith and in but instead the puck skittered through the crease harmlessly.  Minnesota were pretty solid defensively until the very end of the period when the team gave up a shot in the high slot to Monahan who ripped it by Stalock who didn’t seem to see the puck.  The goal came with less than 30 seconds left in the period.  Inexplicably, Wild head coach Bruce Boudreau would challenge the play saying it was offsides.  The replay was fairly definitive that there was no offsides and so Minnesota would get a delay of game penalty on the failed challenge.  It seems pretty dubious that he felt confident enough to challenge what would’ve been a super close offsides call at best.  Minnesota had to feel disappointed being tied at 1-1 after having played so well for 19 minutes of the period and now it had to kill off a penalty to start the 3rd.

3rd Period Thoughts:  The Wild started the period on the penalty kill thanks to the foolish challenge from late in the 2nd period.  Already a man down, the Wild would take another penalty as Suter chopped Johnny Gaudreau’s stick into pieces earning him a trip to the sin bin and giving the Flames a long 5-on-3 power play.  The Flames would capitalize quickly as the puck was worked down low and Kris Versteeg found himself with plenty of space and he’d skate right to the Wild crease and fire a shot from in close that beat Stalock.  2-1 Flames with Boudreau fuming, although he had himself to partially blame for placing the Wild in that situation in the first place.  The Wild tried to claw its way back into the game so it resorted to double shifting the Staal and Koivu lines but neither seemed to have much left in the way of energy.  The Wild just needed a little break and they got it in a steal by Luke Kunin in the neutral zone and he’d move the puck up to Staal who then fed it back to a trailing Suter and then he’d drive the net and the Wild defenseman fired a shot that beat partially screened Smith top shelf tying the game at 2-2.  Less than 2 minutes later the Wild would take the lead on a similar play where Minnesota hustled to hold the zone before Suter fed a pass to Spurgeon who wound up and blistered a shot by Smith, top corner.  3-2 Wild to a stunned Scotiabank Saddledome crowd.  Minnesota would then try to weather the storm of a Calgary effort to tie the game and with a slashing call to Kyle Quincey with about 3:30 left seemed to court disaster.  Stalock and the Wild penalty killers came up with another big effort to keep the puck out of the net.  Daniel Winnik would then seal the deal with an empty net goal and the Wild would escape with a 4-2 win.

Alex Stalock was tremendous, making 35 saves in the victory.  It is pretty lame he wasn’t one of the 3 stars of the game if not the 1st star because he certainly deserved it.  He kept Minnesota in the game when it didn’t really deserve to be there.  He did not have the best support in front of him early on and he came up with stop after stop.  Defensively the team got better as the game went on, but I still think their positioning leaves a lot to be desired and you have to question some of their battle level in and around the blue paint.  On Versteeg’s power play goal, it appeared no one wanted to put their body on him and he was given a free lane to drive the net and score.  That is unacceptable.  That has to improve.

Offensively the Wild keep finding a way to score at least 3 goals per game.  Chris Stewart continues to demonstrate terrific finishing ability as he nets his 6th goal in 5 games.  Decent timing for Stewart giving he’s in a contract year.  Jason Zucker also deserves a ton of credit for his hustle and he was arguably the Wild’s most dangerous player throughout most of the game.  His speed, stickhandling and acceleration allowed him to create scoring chances almost by himself.  The goals from Suter and Spurgeon were big, and its good to see the team get a little traffic in front to disrupt the vision of the goaltender.

This was a big win for a club that was probably feeling a little desperate after a tough loss the night before in Winnipeg.  Minnesota must be smarter about their offsides challenges.  If the team isn’t 100% sure they should probably avoid making the challenge.  Not only do you lose the timeout but you give yourself the potential of a double-whammy by giving up a power play.  Tonight, that poor choice resulted in a goal and the team found a way to overcome it.  Hopefully the Wild coaching staff learn from that experience so we don’t see foolish challenges like that again.  This upcoming week will have the team play on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday instead of 5-days off and a back-to-back like they’ve had the last two weeks.

Wild Notes:

~ The Wild roster tonight was as follows: Mikko Koivu, Jason Zucker, Chris Stewart, Daniel Winnik, Joel Eriksson Ek, Cal O’Reilly, Zack Mitchell, Marcus Foligno, Eric Staal, Luke Kunin, Matt Cullen, Ryan Suter, Jared Spurgeon, Mathew Dumba, Jonas Brodin, Gustav Olofsson and Kyle Quincey.  Devan Dubnyk backed up Alex Stalock.

~ The 3 Stars of the Game were: 1st Star Ryan Suter, 2nd Star Sean Monahan, 3rd Star Chris Stewart

~ Attendance was 18,436 at Scotiabank Saddledome.

Iowa Wild Report:

Iowa 3, Manitoba 2

The 1st period saw two teams that were playing well defensively as Eric Comrie and Niklas Svedberg looked solid between the pipes.  The stalemate would be broken in the closing seconds of the first as former Michigan State star Mason Appleton raced into the Iowa zone and sent a centering pass that was tapped home by Jack Roslovic to put the Moose up 1-0.  Iowa would answer back quickly in the 2nd as Evan Janssen stole a puck near the blueline and he rifled a shot from just above the circle that beat Comrie tying the game at 1-1.  The Wild would take the lead about 7 minutes later on the power play as Ryan Murphy set up Kyle Rau for a wicked one-timer from the high slot that found the twine.  Manitoba would even the game back up a few minutes later when Michael Sgarbossa flung a shot from long range that got by Svedberg to make it 2-2 going into the 3rd.  Late in the 3rd period, the Wild were pesky on the puck and Christoph Bertschy tapped a puck over to Colton Beck who let go a quick shot that beat Comrie and Iowa would come away with a 3-2 win.  Svedberg had 26 saves in the win.

Wild Prospect Report:

RW – Dmitry Sokolov (Sudbury, OHL) ~ the hard shooting winger had a helper and 6 shots on goal in Sudbury’s 5-2 loss to Sarnia last night.  Sokolov has 6 goals, 12 points, 2 PIM’s and has an ‘even’ +/- rating through 11 games.

D – Louie Belpedio (Miami, NCHC) ~ the well-built senior defenseman had a big night for the Redhawks as he had the game winning goal and an assist and 4 shots on goal in Miami’s 7-4 win over Maine on Friday night.  He followed that up with another helper on Saturday in a 6-3 loss.

LW – Brandon Duhaime (Providence, H-East) ~ the Florida-native is off to a good start with the Friars this season as he had an assist, 3 shots on goal and finished the night with a +2 rating in Providence’s wild 6-5 overtime win over St. Lawrence.  Duhaime has a goal, 2 assists, 21 PIM’s in 4 games this season.

LW – Jordan Greenway (Boston U., H-East) ~ the power forward had an assist, 3 shots on goal and like Duhaime finished with a +2 rating in a 2-2 tie for the Terriers against Connecticut.  The next night, the former U.S. National Development Team star had 2 more helpers in a 6-3 win over the Huskies.  Greenway has a goal, 4 assists, 6 PIM’s and is a +3 in 6 games.

RW – Nick Swaney (Minnesota-Duluth, NCHC) ~ he may have been just ‘ok’ at Minnesota Wild Development Camp this summer, but he’s looking great so far for the Bulldogs.  Swaney had another big night playing on the top line where he had a goal and an assist in UMD’s 7-2 win over Merrimack on Saturday.  Swaney leads UMD in points with 2 goals, 7 points, 2 PIM’s and is a +1 in 6 games.

LW – Avery Peterson (Minnesota-Duluth, NCHC) ~ the former Mr. Hockey also had a nice night on Saturday with 2 goals in the 7-2 rout of Merrimack.  Peterson has 2 goals, 3 points, 4 PIM’s and is a +3 in 5 games.