Minnesota Wild Open Practice Review

The Minnesota Wild hosted an open practice on Saturday, free to the public, along with some other events like a 5/10k run, and single game tickets going on sale that morning. Here’s my day as I made the trek to downtown St. Paul.

7:00 AM: Wake up, let the dog out, grab my first heaping bowl of Peanut Butter Crunch.

7:30 AM: Read less than favorable reviews on my last article. Weep into my second heaping bowl of Peanut Butter Crunch. Remind myself it’s training camp for everyone, even me.

8:00 AM: Out the door, gas station stop, and I forget to grab something caffeinated. This will haunt me later.

8:30 AM: Arrive at the Xcel, walk by the new Mobile Hockey Lodge trailer, resist blowing paycheck. There’s a few runners milling around, and plenty of booths and support staff related to the Breakaway 5/10K/mile race. Probably glad I missed the crowd there, the turnout looked incredible. I didn’t even notice the camped out line of single game ticket purchasers that I saw pictures of later, I guess I just wasn’t paying attention.

8:35 AM: Walk into the building, feel the flood of memories come back, as I’ve never realized before that even the Xcel has that icy hockey arena smell when it’s this empty. I find a sweet seat right on the red line a few rows up behind the box, and watch the breakout drills already in progress, followed by a drill that starts 1 on 1 one direction, then following the shot on net, becomes 2 on 1 in the other direction. Corbin Baldwin has nice defensive play on one of the 1 on 1s that raised my eyebrow. Looking around, this is definitely a family event, tons of kids here, and very few lonely observers such as myself. It may sound corny, but it’s nice to see support for a team like this weeks before the even start the season, really shows the love this area has for the game. Also, I notice the scoreboard still being finished in the rafters. It’s tough to tell with it covered up, but it looks pretty big. We’re not talking AT&T Stadium big, but definitely a sizable upgrade.

8:55 AM: They switch into neutral zone breakouts using full lines now, and lines we all presume they’ll start the season with. This practice is group B, so I get a look at the Mikko Koivu/Charlie Coyle/Thomas Vanek line, paired up with Ryan Suter and Jonas Brodin on defense, all in red practice jerseys together. Suter looks as smooth as ever, and though it doesn’t seem like the forwards have gelled together yet, they’ve got plenty of time to, and the talent is obviously there.

9:05 AM: The ice is resurfaced, so I get up to grab something to drink. I’m handed a hot chocolate, then asked if it feels like it’s cold. It is. It’s training camp for everyone folks, even the concession lady.

9:25 AM: The scrimmage finally begins, and the lower bowl at the Xcel is not packed, but pretty full, especially on the long sides. There’s probably a thousand people here, at least, and loads of them are fresh off of the 5/10k deal. It’s impressive. The scoring comes fast and furious in the scrimmage, as right off the bat Jon Blum whiffs on a pinch that’s turned into an odd man rush and a Brett Sutter goal past Niklas Backstrom for Team White, which was announced as a goal by Nino Neidereiter, who wasn’t even on the ice, thoroughly confusing me (it’s training camp for everyone folks, even the announcer). Then Team Green strikes back with a flurry of goals. Cody Almond gets a nice backdoor setup, and absolutely top shelves it on Darcy Kuemper, who was in for a rough stretch. Not long after, Brady Brassart hits a slapper from mid-range that I’m not sure ever left the ice. Kuemper’s head drops, as he knew that was a soft one. Suter then follows it up with a howitzer from the blue line to cap off the feeding frenzy.

Kuemper’s rustiness was pretty evident, and could’ve probably been expected, as this was the first time he had hit the ice with the team, and by his own admission, the first time in a while he had faced shots. In an article by Michael Russo, Head Coach Mike Yeo said he probably should’ve put Kuemper in the first group on the ice to get him a little more warmed up.

The White Team gets another goal after a nifty move in traffic from Marco Scandella nets one past Backstrom, and although they’re without a top line like the Green Team (players from Group B), the White Team(Group C) is keeping up with them, going back and forth and putting up a good fight. However, Stephane Veilleux and Koivu add a goal each to the tally for the Green Team, and the buzzer sounds for the first half, and the Zambonis come on.

10:00AM: The second half starts, with Johan Gustafsson in nets for the Green and crowd favorite (especially amongst the male 20-30 year old crowd) Ilya Bryzgalov in for White. Pretty much right off the bat, the complexion of the scrimmage changes, as Bryzgalov stuffs Coyle on a beautiful setup cross-crease from Vanek. It would become more evident that the goalies had caught up to the skaters, or the skaters just were not getting the chances they were in the first half. Soon thereafter, Stu Bickel is  hauled down from behind on a rush, and instead of having a power play, they give him a penalty shot, with Gustafsson stuffs. Not to be outdone, Bryzgalov stuffs Vanek on a penalty shot moments later. I’m not exactly sure why the opted for penalty shots over power plays, but it might be they don’t have the power play/penalty kill units together with the grouping they’re using.

At the end of the scoreless second half, they had a little 3 man shootout. Coyle starts off and is stuffed by Bryzgalov, Justin Fontaine tries to deke Gustafsson, but is also unsuccessful. Vanek comes in slowly on Bryzgalov, picks a spot and hits it, and Scandella follows that up by missing wide on a move on Gustafsson. Koivu then takes the puck, and while we’re all expecting his patented backhand, he goes triple deke instead, and puts a forehand shot over Bryzgalov’s shoulder. Finally, new signee Michael Keranen comes down on Gustafsson across the front of the net, slams on the brakes half way, and pushes the puck into the open net with one hand, which gets a nice pop from the appreciative crowd. Keranen impressed during the scrimmage to me, he seems to a have a pretty hard shot and the skills to put together some offense. It’ll be interesting to see where he’s put at the beginning of the season, as I think he could contribute a little. Also impressive was invitee Ryan Walters, a Rosemount native fresh out of University of Nebraska-Omaha, he was really skating his ass off, for lack of a better term, to make this team. Hopefully his efforts are rewarded with a minor league deal somewhere.

10:30 AM: Following the Green Team doing some conditioning and a resurfacing, Kumper and Bryzgalov come out with some coaches for some individual work. Keumper looks much better in this workout than he did during the scrimmage, obviously, his reactions were a little sharper, and his butterfly looked good. Bryzgalov, on the other hand didn’t look quite as good at first, seemed a little slow going up and down, but all in all he got it together and looked alright. Andrew Brunette is amongst the coaches helping out, and I have to say, his hat wings are already in mid-season form. Bravo.

10:50 AM: After the rest of Group C hits the ice, with the top NHL line out there being Jason Zucker, Fontaine and Tyler Graovac, who was apparently filling in on that line for a dinged up Kyle Brodziak. The whole group runs through the same progression of drills I saw earlier, and would see later, some neutral zone breakouts and offensive zone setup, followed by the 1 on 1/2 on 1 drill I mentioned before, followed by a full 5 on 5 breakout drill with Yeo throwing the puck around every few seconds to see different angles of the line breaking out. New acquisition Jordan Schroeder looks good so far in this group, making plays and getting some pretty good shots off.

11:30 AM: Group C conditions and leaves, another resurfacing, followed by Nordy appearing with his t-shirt gun. A dad a few sections over reaches up and one hands a fired t-shirt, and the crowd goes wild. That guy is also in mid-season form, clearly. Goalies John Curry, Alexandre Belanger and Brandon Whitney take the ice first to do the same drills I saw Kuemper and Bryzgalov do earlier. Whitney impressed me there, if for nothing else but his size, at 6’5″, but he moved really well for that size, and he might be someone worth watching down the road. The dwindling crowd erupts as Zach Parise, Mikael Grandlund and Jason Pominville finally take the ice with Group A, the last group of the day.

12:15 PM: Group A goes into the practice routine I’ve been seeing all day, and it seems to be going pretty well. One interesting thing I noticed was Colorado College product Gustav Olofsson getting time with the Parise line on the breakout drills, alternating out with Keith Ballard and Christain Folin. Olofsson doesn’t look out of place there, and Yeo seems to be paying close attention to him. I finally get a chance to see the much heralded Matt Dumba live, and I’m mildly disappointed. He only gets to fire off a few shots, which seemed erratic but firm, and his passing isn’t super crisp, as a breakout was stopped by Yeo after he missed a teammate in the neutral zone, but he followed that up with a pass on tape upon restarting.

12:40 PM: The group leaves the ice, and the Zambonis come on. Having already seen the routine, I head out, and am struck upon leaving the Xcel with warm sunshine, something I’m not accustomed to after leaving that particular place, but it was very welcome. I brave the terrors of 35E one more time, and pick up some Taco Bell on the way home to watch Gopher football.

Not a bad way to spend your Saturday.