Veteran goaltender interested in returning to Wild for 21st NHL season

Future Hall-of-Fame netminder Marc-André Fleury hasn’t decided he’s ready to hang up his skates and is open to returning to the Wild next season, he told NHL.com/fr Senior Reporter Jean-François Chaumont this week.

If Fleury returns for his 21st year in the NHL, it will only be in the Twin Cities. The pending UFA told Chaumont that he “wouldn’t want to move and take my three kids out of their environment” and that “it’s probably Minnesota or retirement.”

The 39-year-old has occupied the 1A role in Minnesota as the Wild try to claw their way into the final wild-card spot in the Western Conference. Fleury started eight of 12 games in March. He was excellent for most of that stretch, going 4-1-1 with a .936 SV% between March 2 and March 16, but he has now surrendered five goals in his last two starts.

It hasn’t been a season to write home about for him or tandem partner Filip Gustavsson, who has logged save percentages under .900 after serving as one of the league’s better goalie tandems a season ago. His .899 SV% is his lowest since his first two NHL seasons with the Penguins in 2003-04 and 2005-06 behind a team that was inarguably the league’s worst defensively. However, that didn’t stop him from overtaking Patrick Roy for second place on the league’s all-time wins list earlier this season, now nine ahead of his countryman with 560.

He’s still been serviceable as a backup and has bounced back from a highly disappointing 2021-22 campaign split between the Wild and the Blackhawks, where his -17.2 goals saved above expected was fourth-worst in the NHL, per MoneyPuck. He may not move the needle much if he returns for his age-40 season — his birthday is in November — but there’s reason to believe he can still keep pace with the NHL game.

Obviously, Fleury believes he can, citing his increased comfort level and “rediscovered joy” as the season progressed. The netminder said that while he never reached a final decision, he entered the 2023-24 campaign thinking “it was going to be my last season,” a feeling exacerbated by hip problems he said plagued him as Minnesota struggled out of the gate.

Those are in the rearview now, and he’s ready to return if he still has a place in the organization. He made it clear to Chaumont that he knows that’s not a guarantee, saying he’ll speak with Minnesota GM Bill Guerin about his vision for next season and if the team feels top goaltending prospect Jesper Wallstedt is ready for a full-time role alongside Gustavsson, who has two seasons remaining on his contract.

Wallstedt, the 20th overall pick in the 2021 draft, struggled in his NHL debut in January, conceding seven goals on 34 shots in a rout at the hands of the Stars. However, he’s had a strong second season in the minors with AHL Iowa, posting a .911 SV% and 20-17-3 record in 40 games behind a weaker squad. He was also sent to the AHL All-Star Game after making it as a rookie last season.

Guerin told Chaumont that he’s “more than open to the possibility of seeing him coming back for another season” and “there’s still some gas left in his tank.” Fleury’s made it clear that money won’t be a major consideration on a one-year extension and could very well take as low as the league minimum salary as Minnesota continues to navigate a tough salary cap situation created by the buyouts of Zach Parise and Ryan Suter, which still combine for a $14.7M dead cap charge next season.

It would be the second extension the Quebec native signs in Minnesota. After coming over from Chicago ahead of the 2022 trade deadline, he signed a two-year, $7M deal with full no-move protection to close out his days of earning multi-year contracts.