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Minnesota Wild: Key statistics that need some team focus

ByLuke Ryan|
ST. PAUL, MN - OCTOBER 6: Devan Dubnyk #40 of the Minnesota Wild makes an acrobatic save during a game between the Minnesota Wild and Las Vegas Golden Knights at Xcel Energy Center on October 6, 2018 in St. Paul, Minnesota. (Photo by Bruce Kluckhohn/NHLI via Getty Images)
ST. PAUL, MN - OCTOBER 6: Devan Dubnyk #40 of the Minnesota Wild makes an acrobatic save during a game between the Minnesota Wild and Las Vegas Golden Knights at Xcel Energy Center on October 6, 2018 in St. Paul, Minnesota. (Photo by Bruce Kluckhohn/NHLI via Getty Images)
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ST. PAUL, MN - OCTOBER 16: Devan Dubnyk #40 of the Minnesota Wild makes a save on Christian Fischer #36 of the Arizona Coyotes during a game between the Minnesota Wild and Arizona Coyotes at Xcel Energy Center on October 16, 2018 in St. Paul, Minnesota. The Wild defeated the Coyotes 2-1.(Photo by Bruce Kluckhohn/NHLI via Getty Images)
ST. PAUL, MN – OCTOBER 16: Devan Dubnyk #40 of the Minnesota Wild makes a save on Christian Fischer #36 of the Arizona Coyotes during a game between the Minnesota Wild and Arizona Coyotes at Xcel Energy Center on October 16, 2018 in St. Paul, Minnesota. The Wild defeated the Coyotes 2-1.(Photo by Bruce Kluckhohn/NHLI via Getty Images)

With 36.8 shots against per game, Dubnyk and Stalock are certainly earning their pay-cheques for the Minnesota Wild.

Chances are that one or two of them is going in, regardless the calibre of your goaltender. Anything above thirty-five shots is way too many in the NHL.

Despite sitting with the second worst shots against record, the Minnesota Wild are actually middle of the table when it comes to Scoring Chances Against, sitting 16th worst in the league.

This suggests that whilst they’re allowing shots to make it on net, they’re not necessarily allowing proper chances on net. Some of these shots could well be pucks that are dumped into their zone with a bit of pace on them or very low-risk shots looking purely for rebounds.

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Further to that, the High Danger Scoring Chances Against are actually the 12th lowest across the league which further highlights that whilst they’re conceding shots against, they’re not conceding high risk shots or even so much as chances as anywhere near the same rate.

Now this is likely down to a couple of things; namely that the defensive core is actually quite a strong defensive unit. Greg Pateryn is finding his feet, Ryan Suter looks fully mended and the likes of Jonas Brodin and Jared Spurgeon are quietly doing what they do so well.

Of course, behind them the leagues sixth best save percentage also helps.

The reality is that the Minnesota Wild were very slow out of the blocks and this may well have skewed these statistics to read a lot worse than the ‘eye test’ actually tells.

Now, don;t get me wrong, in the early going this Minnesota Wild team was no fun to watch. They were getting seriously beat up on when they hit the ice.

Following such a good week this past one, I don’t think we’ll see a repeat performance. I think we now have a Minnesota Wild team that is back on-track and looking far more like the team that we iced last season in terms of its compete rate.

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