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Trends Continue As Wild Win in Edmonton |
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With the first month in the books now the Wild own a solid 7-3-2 record after last night's 4-3 come from behind victory in Edmonton. The Wild special teams were the story as the PK successfully killed all five Edmonton powerplays, while the Minnesota PP connected on all three of their man advantage opportunities.
So now that we have completed the October game schedule what have we learned about the Wild?
Well the trends are that the Wild will be out shot in the first period and yield the first goal of the contest. Those two trends have occurred in 10 of the 12 games and 9 of 12, respectively. Overall the Wild have been dramatically out shot in first periods by a whopping 150-97 margin.
While the first period trend is not good at all, the third period trend is almost the exact opposite, with the Wild out shooting their opponents in the final frame,11 of the 12 games in October. The overall margin of Wild third period shots to opponents shots is 146-98.
The other trend that continued for Minnesota, was winning the second half of back to backs, bringing their record to 3-0 in such meetings.
We know that the Wild are a veteran team, with lots of experience, but why is it that they come out flat, but rise to the occasion as the game moves along?
That is something that Bruce Boudreau needs to figure out, at least the slow start aspect. But the strong finish is very encouraging, especially from a team that is basically the same group of players that we saw skate off the ice in Winnipeg after dropping yet another first round playoff series last April.
The road trip continues on Saturday in St. Louis, but the boys do get to come back to the State of Hockey, for some home cooking and practice at the TRIA Rink before hitting the road once again, to continue the longest away stretch in club history.
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