The Minnesota Wild are somehow 5-3 to start the season and have a new and unique feel to them that I personally don’t think we’ve ever experienced on the team for years. There is a clear youth movement in the Minnesota Wild, and that is in part thanks to the work of one mastermind general manager: Bill Guerin. The team dynamic feels fast, loose, and for the first time since the days of Jacques Lemaire, fun.
Let’s first start with the youth movement. There’s clearly some big players still left from the old-guard, Ryan Suter and Zach Parise most noticeably, but there is Jared Spurgeon (who is on the wrong side of 30), Backup goalie Alex Stalock (33), Marcus Foligno (29), Jonas Brodin (27), and Matt Dumba (26). While Spurgeon and Foligno are continuing to play at a decent level, Suter and Parise’s ages are catching up to them at a creeping pace. Of the old guard, the few who definitely have a few solid years left are Spurgeon, Foligno, and Dumba.
The new guard brings much needed speed and skill to the team, including but not exclusively, Karill Kaprizov (23), Marco Rossi (19), Jordan Greenway (23), Joel Eriksson Ek (24), goaltender Kaapo Khäkönen (24), and Kevin Fiala (24). What makes them so unique is that they all seem to mesh together well, and are playing at a high level so early in their careers. Karill Kaprizov currently stands as the odds on favorite to become the winner of the coveted Calder Cup. Kaprizov was drafted by the Wild in 2015 and had been hyped by both the franchise and the fan-base for the coming years. With his incredible debut, it appears that the hype was bang-on. Unfortunately, Marco Rossi is unable to play due to injury and it may be likely he will be bumped down to the Iowa Wild for recuperation before coming back. Khakonen currently stands as the secondary backup to Cam Talbot and Stalock. That leaves Fiala, Ek, Greenway, and Nico Sturm (25). Sturm has shown flashes of excellence at times, and Fiala, Ek, and Greenway’s skills are fairly well known due to having been on the team the last few years.
The next best thing regarding the team is thanks in part to the head coach himself: Dean Evason. Evason is a clear difference from his predecessor, the bull-headed and futile Bruce Boudreau. Evason seems to have garnered the respect of his players and this may have to do with his style of coaching. When Boudreau was hired in 2016, his focus was on slow, safe, and defensive play with offensive flair. This could work with solid goaltending and with a lead, but was disastrous in other circumstances, such as being down several goals or when your goalie is tiring. This was most exacerbated in the 2019, with former goaltender Devan Dubnyk’s career nadir. Instead, Dean has focused nearly entirely on fast, quick paced offense with a notably defensive flair. With the addition of notably solid goalie Cam Talbot (who is likely a one year rental to set up Khäkönen), Minnesota’s defensive woes have seemingly disappeared. The play on the ice is notably faster paced, more exciting, and leads to more scoring opportunities than Boudreau’s old style.
While it is much too early to tell whether the 5-3 start is a fluke, I think in two year’s time, we will possibly get to understand the trajectory that this team is taking. Let’s hope for the best, and let us ride on the capes of Bill Geurin and Dean Evason that maybe someday Minnesota will crawl out of the pit of playoff futility.