The State of Hockey…In the State of Hockey (Second Week Edition)

The State of Hockey's golden boys, the Minnesota Wild, had a phenomenal second week of the regular season. With two wins, the Wild defeated both the St. Louis Blues and Columbus Blue Jackets on the road and finished the week with four points as they continued their early season road trip.

With the team scoring seven goals this week, we'll have just as much insight for this week's State of Hockey…In the State of Hockey.

-Filip Gustavsson has found his groove again between the pipes. His season stats are off the charts (1.49 GGA; 0.950 SV%) and he only conceded two goals in both games combined, posting a remarkable 0.962 SV% for the week. Add in his first goalie goal (and the first in Minnesota Wild history), and it makes perfect sense that he was the NHL's “third star” of the week. His start to the season is incredibly exciting.

-Jacob Middleton is currently third in the NHL with nineteen players this season. I still worry about the longevity of his contract with the Wild, but this statistic is encouraging. He was remarkably durable during his time in Minnesota, so that's in the plus column when talking about him. It will be that he maintains his current blocking pace and adds a few more hits while continuing to avoid a negative +/- so I can fully accept his current contract. But I'm getting a little warmer to it.

-The Wild have accumulated just 24 total penalty minutes so far this season, an average of 4.8 penalty minutes per game. After finishing the 2023-24 season with an average of 11.4 penalty minutes per game, the Wild cost the Wild games all season long with untimely and often idiotic penalties. With a current penalty kill percentage of 75.0% in need of improvement, keeping penalty minutes as low as they have been is a step in the right direction.

-The Wild have not fallen behind so far in this young season, fifteen periods in total. The 3-0-2 record hurts a bit. Looking back, Winnipeg's loss in OT didn't hurt as much as the Seattle Kraken beating us in a game I think we controlled. It's still early in the season, but with all the competitive teams in the Western Conference, could this missed point come back to haunt us?

-Jesper Wallstedt will be 22 years old in a few weeks. The way Filip Gustavsson has played, coupled with the fact that this is Marc-André Fleury's final NHL season and Wallstedt is getting the bulk of his minutes in Iowa (along with some timely games against Minnesota), is the best course of action for Jesper's development. The new two-year extension he recently signed starting next season was great for the organization and Wallstedt. Spending another year in the AHL to prepare for becoming a full-time NHL player will be of great benefit to Wallstedt in the future. The fans in Des Moines must really appreciate seeing Jesper play in Iowa.

-Wild GM Bill Guerin must have an extension for Marco Rossi high on his “to-do” list. The progress in Marco's game since his bout with COVID and his descent to Iowa after a poor start to the 2022-23 season is significant. What's not to love about Rossi being at the helm with Zuccy and Krill? Combined with the Wild's second line (Boldy/Eriksson Ek/Johansson), I would compare Minnesota's combined top lines to any other franchise.

-As much as it hurts that captain Jared Spurgeon is injured and unavailable again this season, does anyone else feel like there's enough leadership on this roster that it won't hurt the team like it did last season? Don't get me wrong… I want Spurgeon back in the mix, but we certainly don't look anywhere near lost without him.

Results of the first week's predictions

Prediction #1: The Wild will win both games of the week (10/15 at St. Louis and 10/19 at Columbus) on the road and double their season points total.

Result: Correct… The Wild defeated the Blues 4-1 in St. Louis and the Blue Jackets 3-1 in Columbus, doing great in both games. Great start to this monster road trip.

Prediction #2: Matt Boldy will finish the week at a sustained season pace of 100 points.Matt

Result: False… Boldy fell off the 100-point pace as he was held to just one point in the Wild's two games. He now has a pace of 98.4…

Prediction #3: Johnny Stache will continue to be the proud owner of a positive plus/minus rating.

Result: Correct… After falling to even par during the Blues game, The Stacheman had an assist against the Blue Jackets and is currently back to a +1 plus/minus rating.

Prediction #4: Marcus Foligno will have his first fight of the year.

Result: False… We need to see a kinder and gentler Foligno this season. There has to be some fear and anger brewing inside Marcus, right?

Prediction #5: Kaprizoz/Zuccy score at least two points during the week.

Result: Correct… At least that's what I'm assuming… Zuccy and Kirill assisted on Rossi's goal against the Blues and Kaprizov assisted on Zuccy's goal in Columbus.

So… 3-2 for this week, so I'm well on my way to becoming an awesome forecaster!

The five predictions for next week…

-The Wild will emerge with at least four points from the three away games (Lightning/Panthers/Flyers) this week.

-Liam Ohgren will get his first point of the season this week,

-Matt Boldy will get back on the right side of the 100-point pace with outstanding play this week.

-The Wild's power play scores at least two points in the week's three contests.

-Kaprizov ends the week with at least five points.