Minnesota Wild: Is Joel Eriksson Ek the player we hoped after game 100?

When the Minnesota Wild drafted Joel Eriksson Ek in the first round (20th overall) in the 2015 NHL Entry Draft, they obviously had high hopes for the young Swede. After playing his 100th NHL game recently, we look at the player he now is.

Going into the draft, the Minnesota Wild obviously had targeted Joel Eriksson Ek to fulfil a need for a center.

It’s unlikely that the Wild back-office staff had expectations of acquiring an elite goalscorer; his numbers in the Swedish league, the SHL put paid to that theory. Including the time he played over there after being drafted, he had a 0.35 points-per-game record; a low scoring rate even in a league that produces some elite defensemen.

Upon eventually departing his home country, Eriksson Ek was given a game with the Iowa Wild and a fifteen game audition with the Minnesota Wild, notching seven points and adding his first three NHL play-off appearances to cap a nice start to his North American career.

It’s funny to look back and see that he came into the league with such promise, scoring at a rate of a point every second game.

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Since then, he only recently broke a ten-plus game streak of not scoring, not the sort of streak any player wants lingering over them.

He struggled hugely early on this season, not gelling with new line mates Charlie Coyle and Jordan Greenway in the slightest. Their line often times looked lost and directionless.

Now, however, it seems they’ve smartened up their act. Joel Eriksson Ek is back to being defensively responsible, ensuring he and his line mates try to play a 200-foot game and not just fooling around in the offensive zone.

He has shown significant improvement in the small sample size this year of face-offs, winning 50%. Previously that number was in the low forties.

He is also now routinely thrown out by Minnesota Wild head coach Bruce Boudreau to kill penalties. Given Boudreau’s somewhat old-school tendencies, this can be seen as a real ‘feather in the cap’ for the Swede.

All in all, it’s safe to say that whilst Eriksson Ek isn’t the biggest name to be drafted in the 2015 NHL Entry Draft, nor the most talented; he is certainly carving out his own niche as a defensively responsible center.

100 games in, he may not quite be a truly well-rounded defensive center, but he’s well on his way. Should he continue his development trajectory, continually improving in the face-off circle and maybe upping his production just a little (offense is a good form of defense, after all), we should be alright for a considerable amount of time.

Eriksson Ek could well be the successor to Mikko Koivu. At least, that’s the level we should hope he can achieve.

Statistics courtesy of Elite Prospects.