Minnesota Wild Clinch Playoff Berth With Win Over The Sharks

With the regulation win over the San Jose Sharks, the Minnesota Wild are headed back to the playoffs for the 8th time in the last 9 seasons. Over that stretch, they have only been outside of the first round three times.

With just nine games remaining, seven of which are at home, the Minnesota Wild have clinched a ticket to the postseason.

For most hockey fans around the league, the Minnesota Wild are not usually a team that you would consider a contender, but this year has proven otherwise from the great work of Bill Guerin and superstar rookie Kirill Kaprizov.

Minnesota Wild: What’s different from previous years?

Between 2013 and 2018 the Minnesota Wild were one of the best regular-season teams in the league. Under Chuck Fletcher, the Wild in that span only made it out of the first round twice. Both times, they were eliminated by the Chicago Blackhawks. It took six games in 2013-2014, but the Wild were swept in 2014-2015. Lucky for us, we won’t be seeing the Hawks this year.

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Despite winning a lot and collecting three 100 point seasons in the span of five years, the Wild never really could put together a significant postseason run.

The Wild have only had six different players to score 30 goals in a single season in their 20 years of existence. Gaborik did it five times, Brian Rolston did it three times, and Parise, Staal, and Zucker all hit it one time.

They never really had a superstar either or played an exciting game of hockey like some powerhouse teams we see today. Top-notch star power has been limited to the former days of Marian Gaborik and regression of Zach Parise and Ryan Suter has not helped recently.

Kirill Kaprizov has completely changed this team. A complete season changer and possible franchise player.

Part of the Wild’s impressive 2021 campaign has been credited to the incredible duo of Kaprizov and Zuccarello. With those two during 5-on-5 play, the Wild are averaging 2.63 goals per 60 minutes, compared to just 0.95 when only one of them is on the ice (per Natural Stat Trick).

Are the Minnesota Wild truly a contender?

This season the Minnesota Wild are 23-6-1 against Anaheim, Arizona, Los Angeles, and San Jose and 7-6-1 against the big guns Colorado and Vegas, and 1-1-1 against St. Louis. For the Minnesota Wild to truly make a Stanley Cup run they would have to beat two of Vegas, Colorado, and likely St. Louis in a best-of-seven series just to get to the Stanley Cup Semifinals.

Not only is that a hard enough task, but that’s also only halfway to the Cup. All three of those teams have beaten the Wild pretty bad this year and all play hard physical games that could exhaust the Wild’s legs for the next series.

The Stanley cup is a very hard trophy to get, but with the Wild’s very solid goaltending this year and impressive line combinations they could be a big-time sleeper to make a Stanley cup run.

Can the Wild make it past the Avs or Knights in the playoffs and make a run? Let’s know what you think. Tweet us at @FSGonePuckWild

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