Minnesota Wild: Hat Trick Secures Wild’s First Win of Preseason
The Minnesota Wild finally put a mark in the win column, with a 7-0 beat down of the Colorado Avalanche. We’ve got our top performers for the game.
There was no worry of a late game collapse in this one, as the Minnesota Wild scored the first goal and the flood gates opened from there.
By the time the final buzzer sounded to put the Colorado players out of their misery, there was a simple message to infer from this game: The Minnesota Wild are finding their stride.
Every line for the Wild scored at least one goal in this game, only 2 of the 12 forwards failed to record a point, and the 3 Defense currently guaranteed their roster spots all looked fantastic.
Now, to be fair, the lineup sent against us by Colorado was one with only about 3-4 skaters who are likely to be in the opening night roster on October 4th. I personally think we owe the Colorado coaches and management a thank you for this.
The Wild had looked lethargic in the preseason to this point. The fans were getting antsy and pessimistic watching the team throw games away late in the 3rd. Seeing what amounts to about 75% of the opening night roster blow up the scoreboard should ease some of those nerves.
It definitely eased the nerves of the players on the ice. Minnesota came into this game expecting to be dominant, and wanting to see a crisp and clean 60 minute effort from all 19 players on the ice.
They were absolutely dominant through all 3 periods. The team were a little sloppy in the first with missed passes, turnovers, and shots missing the goal through the first 10 minutes or so.
Colorado’s only sustained offensive attack came at the end of the 1st, following a Wild penalty. In the 2nd, the mistakes were cleaned up and the scorers went to work.
This should be a great boost for team morale, and lead to more sustained offense for the remainder of the preseason schedule. I’m personally excited to see us do it again against these same Avs in a couple weeks.
After every Minnesota Wild game I’m going to give my Top 3 Wild Performers of the game, and an honorary mention to the top performer of our opponent. I greatly appreciate any feedback you have on these recaps, and anything you’d like to see from them in the future.
Colorado Avalanche’s Sheldon Dries
There wasn’t much to be happy about from the players the Avalanche put on the ice in this one. It was a dismal effort for all involved, and certainly a clear show of where they stand against true NHL talent.
There was a bright spot on the night, buried underneath all of the negativity around a 7-0 loss. Rookie forward prospect Sheldon Dries actually finished the game as one of only 2 Avalanche players to not have a negative +/-.
My first instinct was to think perhaps he didn’t play much, or wasn’t facing any of the top lines, but a look at the play-by-play on NHL.com actually shows that he was on the ice against the Koivu and Staal lines more often than not.
On top of that, Dries was among the Colorado leaders in ice-time for the game with 17 minutes played. He went 50% (3 for 6) in the faceoff circle, starting most of his shifts in the defensive zone, and winning 1 faceoff each against Mikko Koivu, Eric Staal, and Mikael Granlund.
Dries also led the Avs in shots on goal, with 4 shots making it through, and was a consistent member of both their power play and penalty kill through the night.
Sheldon Dries is a 24 year old NHL Rookie, who played USHL hockey in Green Bay and NCAA hockey at Western Michigan. He is seemingly come out of nowhere, playing last season on an AHL contract with the Texas Stars before signing an NHL deal with Colorado this summer.
Honestly, watching the game there was nobody on Colorado who stood out to me. The entire team looked like amatuers playing against pros, which is what it was. To look at the final stats and see Dries stat line, I’m a little surprised myself by his performance.
He wasn’t eye catching during the game, and if you can’t pass the eye test chances are you won’t have a place on the NHL Roster. But if he can maintain performances like this in the AHL, he may yet find his way into the Avalanche roster.
Jared Spurgeon & Jonas Brodin
This one is going astray from the single player theory again, but this pairing was so stellar I couldn’t pick one or the other. They played together on the top pair, leaving Matt Dumba to play with the roster hopefuls and oh my, did they ever shine.
Jonas Brodin finished the game with 2 assists, a +5 rating, and over 20 minutes of ice-time. Jared Spurgeon was a +4 (he was on the ice for the PP Goal), and also had 2 assists and 20 minutes of ice time.
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I looked at this possibility a couple times through my season previews of each player, but I think this should be a realistic combo this season sooner rather than later.
Dumba should be given an opportunity to play with Ryan Suter, and these 2 performing like this when placed together means Bruce should be comfortable giving that line-up a long look.
When Spurgeon and Brodin were on the ice, the breakouts were crisp, passes were solid, and everything on the ice looked a lot cleaner overall. Nothing against the other D on the night, everyone looked good in this game, but Jared and Jonas really shone.
They were split up on the powerplay, and I believe they should perhaps be swapped on their respective PP units, but both were running their Powerplays very efficiently.
The PP unit only shows as 1 goal on the night, but 2 goals came immediately after penalties expired making it an unofficial 3 goal night for their units. Brodin was out for 2 of them, Spurgeon was out for 2.
Brodin and Spurgeon actually both helped setup Koivu’s 3rd period goal, but Brodin was the uncredited 3rd passer on the goal. Spurgeon had that same uncredited 3rd man assist on Zach Parise’s PP Goal late.
These 2 look great together, and as much as I’ve loved the Spurgeon/Suter pairing for the last 5 years it may be time to shake that up. Hopefully Boudreau is looking at this possibility the same way I’m seeing it.
Eric Staal
Eric Staal’s stat line on the night may not look as rewarding as the other player’s on the team, but his performance definitely told a different story.
Staal finished with only 1 assist over a forward leading 19 minutes of ice-time. Centering the top line in a 7-0 victory, you may expect more than that from your leading scorer, but he was critical to the Wild success in this one.
Staal got the offense going early, and never really let up through the game. His line’s first shift on the ice led to the first powerplay of the game. Staal recorded 5 shots on the night, but had at least a half dozen more prime opportunities that went wide or were knocked off his stick before he got the shot off.
He had the primary assist on Jason Zucker’s opening goal, a chipped puck from behind the net by Staal that sat outside Philipp Grubauer’s reach long enough for Zucker to pounce on it.
Beyond that, Staal was just a steady presence in the center of that line. He controlled play on the powerplay (which I believe should be the #1 unit) and should be a consistent threat from his spot on the end boards.
His big body and sturdy frame make him a difficult player to bump off the puck, he can old it and battle or he can straight stick handle his way through traffic.
Zucker and Granlund are learning to trust the veteran more and more, and have started to look for him in his regular position along the faceoff dots beside the goalie.
This line is only getting better as the preseason goes on, and should be a threat to every opponent on any given night. Give this pairing Suter and Dumba on their blue line, and watch as the goals pile up.
Charlie Coyle
I think I said everything I could about Charlie Coyle in Thursday’s Top 3, but there was no way I could leave him out of the Top 3 for this game after the performance he put out there.
Playing with Jordan Greenway back at center on his line, Coyle just continued to build on what is turning into a fantastic preseason. The Hat trick is just icing on the cake for a guy who has been expected to break out for years.
His first goal was a wonderful individual effort. Coyle took the puck along the end boards, made a quick stick move to leave Tyson Jost looking silly, and snapped a shot from the top of the circle that looked like something you would expect more from a sniper than from Coyle.
The second was a pretty little give-and-go play with Joel Eriksson Ek. Coyle did most of the work, flying down the side boards he made a strong move to evade Anton Lindholm while flipping the puck up to Eriksson Ek.
Ek passed it right back to Coyle, and again in sniper fashion Coyle managed to find a hole in Grubauer that ought not have even existed. Grubauer left a little too much 5-hole showing, and somehow Coyle managed to slip it right through.
The Hat Trick goal was not even a question, it was all about positioning. Brodin made it happen, with a hard faked wrist shot on a breakout rush.
Grubauer and the defenseman, Vladislav Kamenev, both bit hard on the fake from Brodin which left Coyle all alone to take the pass and deposit it in a wide open net.
Obviously there’s going to be a bit of question to this one still, as even Charlie himself wasn’t overly celebrating it on the bench afterwards. This is an AHL Colorado roster who were clearly outmatched. It’s hard to get too excited about it.
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As I mentioned about Thursday’s game, the more Charlie plays the better he is looking. We have seen Nino Niederreiter breakout 2 years ago, Zucker breakout last year, and Coyle steadily getting better each year. Perhaps this is finally his year to rise to the level of his peers.