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Filip Gustavsson, Minnesota Wild (Amy Irvin / The Hockey Writers)

3 Takeaways From the Wild’s 5-0 Win Over the Blues

Originally posted on The Hockey Writers
By Mariah E. Stark | Last updated Oct 10, 2025 8:55 AM ET

The Minnesota Wild started their regular season on Thursday, Oct. 9, on the road against the St. Louis Blues. The Wild got off to a rough start in terms of injuries with Jonas Brodin, Mats Zuccarello, and Nico Sturm out, but they still managed to get the win. The game started out sloppy for both sides, but the Wild got things started first.

They continued to add goals throughout the game and managed to keep the Blues off the scoreboard the entire game as well. Filip Gustavsson was in net for the Wild and earned his first shutout of the season with the 5-0 win. In this article, we’ll look at a few takeaways from the game, starting with Gustavsson’s performance in net.

Gustavsson Takes Shutout

The Wild may have gotten out to an uneasy start to the game, but Gustavsson stepped up to save the day. He came up with stop after stop and had a lucky post or two in between, but his effort made the difference. He was more aggressive in the net than he has been in the past and cut off several attempts before they were able to take the shot.

Not only did he play more aggressively, but also smartly. It may seem obvious when goaltenders should cover or play the puck, but many goaltenders make mistakes in that area, and it leads to goals. Gustavsson used to be one of those goaltenders, but he’s improved over the seasons, and it really showed against the Blues. Being the first game of the season, mistakes are expected, but he was 100 percent all night.

The only thing he didn’t get was a goalie goal, which he did against the Blues last season around this same time. However, if he continues to play like he did against the Blues, that may not be far away.

Wild Kept Focused & Hartman’s Performance

In the past, the Wild would’ve allowed themselves to be distracted by the Blues’ big hits, but this game, they kept focused and played their game. The Blues threw 40 hits to the Wild’s 19, but again, they didn’t retaliate. They were more disciplined, and it paid off; they scored five times, to the Blues zero. While some physicality is good and needed, if the Wild had tried to keep up with the same hits, they likely wouldn’t have won.

They also couldn’t have done it without Ryan Hartman’s efforts. He scored the first goal of the game and the fourth to keep his team in the lead and really put the Blues on their heels. He received a great pass from Marcus Johansson, and then he did some tricky moves to get it past Jordan Binnington, which put his team up 1-0.

His second goal wasn’t quite as fancy, but it was a result of his following through. He went to the net and was rewarded with his second goal of the game. Aside from his goal production, he also went 71.4 percent in the faceoff circle, which contributed to the team’s overall faceoff win percentage of 53.7 percent.

Wild’s Top Line & Special Teams

The final notes from the Wild’s win over the Blues were the efforts of both their top line and their special teams. Hartman stole a bit of the show, but the top line also contributed, with both Matt Boldy and Marco Rossi scoring goals, along with Kaprizov tallying three assists. This is exactly the level of offensive production the Wild expect from their top line, and hopefully, this continues all season and not just one game.

Moving on, the Wild’s special teams were strong against the Blues as well. They struggled on their first two power plays, and when things looked like they wouldn’t go their way, they found a way to score. Joel Eriksson Ek scored from the slot where he works best and got their power play going on the right foot.

While their power play was strong, so was their penalty kill, which struggled a bit in the preseason. The Blues tried to force the Wild to take more penalties, but they stayed disciplined and took just two penalties when it could’ve been a lot more. They dug deep and killed off both penalties and then stayed out of the penalty box the rest of the game.

The Wild started out rough but finished the game strong and started the season off on the right foot. Overall, there are still things to fix, and while they got the win over the Blues, they’ll have to step up if they want to continue to win games. However, it was a great start to the season, and hopefully they’ll find more ways to win.