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Despite Lacking Scoring and Team Toughness, Wild Beat Leafs in Shootout

November 14, 2013, 12:12 PM ET [55 Comments]
Brad Ratgen
Minnesota Wild Blogger • RSSArchiveCONTACT
Time to play word association. What one word answer best describe the following:

The Wild’s 2-1 Shooutout Win Over Toronto:

Bernier:

Backstrom:

Harding:

Kadri:

Parise:

Suter:

Koivu:

Coyle:

Spurgeon:


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Last night's win over the Maple Leafs was one of the more boring games I have seen lately. If the Wild’s game plan was to bore the Leafs to sleep before pouncing on their prey, they succeeded in doing the same to this fan at the game last night. I get it, 2 points are 2 points, but dang, I could not stop yawning. I look forward to the day that Wild fans can be treated to Fall Out Boy’s “My Songs Know What You Did In the Dark”. You know, the one that goes “Light it up, up, up; Light it up, up, up, Light it up, up, up; I’m on fire!” However, you need more than one goal in regulation to get that song played.

For the second time in as many games against the Leafs, the Wild outshot them. However, in fairness, they also made Bernier’s job pretty easy as there were not too many saves that he had to be all world on to make. Notwithstanding, a fine job by the Toronto goaltender and enough to earn him 1st Star honors. Classy job by the Wild for recognizing him as the 1st Star of the game and not being homers and giving it to someone else despite the solid play of Josh Harding (3rd Star of the game) who came in midway through the first period in relief of an injured Niklas Backstrom, despite puking his guts out the night before. For my money, Harding had the better saves, but I’m good with recognizing Bernier’s effort also.

Clearly, the Leafs came out trying to outmuscle the Wild. This is probably the truculence that former GM Brian Burke referred to when building this version of the Leafs and physical play is one of head coach Randy Carlyle’s calling card. However, Kadri took it too far. First, the elbow to Backstrom’s head and then the head shot against Granlund. We can debate both of these hits until we are blue in the face, but Kadri seems to be cut from the same agitator cloth that Matt Cooke came from when in Vancouver. Kadri has a phone conference today with Brendan Shanahan of the NHL’s Department of Player Safety and should get teed up for some well deserved time off. I can’t help but wonder, had Kadri not run Backstrom and injured him, would Toronto have perhaps won last night’s game?

Besides the goaltending from both clubs and Kadri, the real story for Wild fans was Parise and Suter, again. Clearly these two players are the leaders of this team. I’m not even sure why Koivu still has the “C”. Perhaps the Wild are waiting to trade Koivu before they name Zach and Ryan the team captains. As trading Koivu is concerned, he clearly is an asset that the Wild could use to pry away a solid defenseman or two from another club. That is the Wild’s weak suit currently and teams like Toronto are in dire need of quality centers. Perhaps Mikko is untouchable in his Wild sweater. However, I would like to think that he is not untouchable and could fetch some quality blue liners at some point this season.

Lastly, I continue to be impressed with the game play of Charlie Coyle and Jared Spurgeon. Coyle’s physical play and fight with Lupul was good to see. Nino Niederreiter should take note that, at some point, it’s time for him to step up for himself, otherwise teams like Toronto will continue to push him around like last night. And then Spurgeon. There was one series late in the game where he was everywhere and hit Lupul 2 or 3 times in the Wild’s defensive zone. Notwithstanding his small stature, Spurgeon plays very big on the Wild’s blue line.

Here are my answers to the above word association questions:

Wild’s 2-1 Shooutout Win Over Toronto: Uninspiring

Bernier: Stud

Backstrom: Unlucky

Harding: Sick

Kadri: Stupid

Parise: Captain

Suter: Machine

Koivu: Trade

Coyle: Improving

Spurgeon: Little-Big-Man
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