The Minnesota Wild haven’t had the strongest first half of the 2023–24 NHL regular season.
Through 36 games, the Wild currently sit in sixth place in the Central Division with a 16-16-4 record, 36 points, and a minus-5 goal differential. They’ve made a coaching change, two of their top executives have come under investigation, and the team has been bombarded with injuries.
Kirill Kaprizov, Jared Spurgeon, Mats Zuccarello, Jonas Brodin, and Filip Gustavsson are all currently out of the lineup in Minnesota. There’s only so much a top line of Marcus Johansson, Matt Boldy, and Joel Eriksson Ek can do in an ultra-competitive Central Division, and as Daily Faceoff‘s Tyler Yaremchuk and Frank Seravalli discussed on Thursday, it can’t get much worse for this Wild team.
Tyler Yaremchuk: The Minnesota Wild, Frank, after grinding out a few wins once John Hynes got hired, they’ve kind of hit a bit of a skid here. Honestly, it’s pretty easy to look and go, ‘This is all just related to injury’ — the latest of which is Jared Spurgeon, their captain, going on IR. They’ve lost three in a row now, they have a handful of important pieces out of the lineup. This is a tough point for them to be losing momentum. What’s your concern level with this Minnesota team as they grind through having 5-6 key injuries?
Frank Seravalli: It’s still not very high, and that says something given the start to the season that they had, and also the current injuries. You look at Jared Spurgeon and how impactful he is to their team’s success. It’s really no secret to me that when Jared Spurgeon got back and then they made the coaching change, that’s when the Wild started to take off this year under John Hynes. But it’s certainly a scary injury list: Bill Guerin telling Michael Russo from The Athletic that he’s never seen something like this in his career. It’s not just the amount of injuries that have piled up, it’s to key players. We’re not talking bottom-six forwards and third-pair defensemen. These are the absolute heartbeat and core of this team. Kirill Kaprizov, their leading scorer at a point per game. Jared Spurgeon, their captain and best defenseman. Mats Zuccarello. Filip Gustavsson, their starting goalie. Go down the list and then add in Jonas Brodin, and it’s like, ‘Jeez, it can’t really get much worse.’ And the problem for the Wild is that they can’t go out and replace any of these players because they’re already snug up against the cap.
Watch the full episode here:
More must-reads: