Early Season Look In: Kaprizov Brings Excitement The Wild’s Never Had
The long-awaited arrival of a dynamic Russian winger has brought the Minnesota Wild back to life.
The Wild looked dead in 2019 as the team, bogged down by an expensive and aging core, and missed the playoffs with a 37-36-9 record. In only a couple of years, Minnesota is on a completely different trajectory.
Kirill Kaprizov broke into the NHL with 27 goals and 51 points in 2021 and helped the Wild put together a 35-16-5 record, their best in franchise history in terms of points percentage (.670). After some summer stress around Kaprizov potentially returning to Russia, the Wild are off to a nice start in 2021-22 and look like a legitimate contender in the Western Conference.
What to expect in 2021-22…
The Wild have picked up right where they left off last season as they’re 2-0-0 through the first week of play.
They edged out the Anaheim Ducks with a 2-1 victory in their season opener and then they picked up another win the following night by a score of 3-2 over the Los Angeles Kings. Minnesota will finally play their home opener on Wednesday night against the Winnipeg Jets.
The Wild are back in the Central Division this season, which is a different experience than what they had in the West Division last year.
The West Division in 2021 was top-heavy, featuring the Avalanche and Golden Knights, who finished tied for the league lead in points. But the bottom of the division was really weak, as none of the three California teams or the Arizona Coyotes had serious playoff aspirations.
You can make a case for every team in the Central being a legit playoff contender, save for the Coyotes, so this division is going to be quite a battle. If all goes well for the Wild, they’ll be competing with Colorado for top spot in the division, but the Winnipeg Jets and St. Louis Blues will put up a fight.
The Wild haven’t been out of the first round since 2014 and 2015 when they reached the second round and they haven’t reached the Conference Final since 2003 when they went on a shocking run in their third season in the league. This is likely the best and deepest team the Wild have ever had and anything less than a series win come spring would be a letdown.
Players to watch…
I’ve already talked about Kaprizov being the straw that stirs the drink in Minnesota, but there are a handful of other interesting players to pay attention to.
An interesting thing to note about the Wild so far is that their five goals have come from five different players — Kevin Fiala, Marcus Foligno, Frederick Gaudreau, Ryan Hartman and Victor Rask.
Last season, they had eight different players score at least 10 goals, so it wouldn’t be shocking now that we’re back to a normal 82-game slate to see Minnesota wind up with five or six players hit the 20-goal threshold in 2021-22.
Rask is an interesting name to pay attention to. He came to Minnesota in a surprising one-for-one deal that sent Nino Niederreiter to Carolina and he scored just seven goals in his first 66 games with the Wild. Last year, Rask was quietly effective for the Wild, scoring 10 goals in 54 games. He’s an unrestricted free agent for the first time in his career at the end of the season, so there’s plenty of motivation for a big campaign.
Also, 2020 No. 9 overall pick Marco Rossi is back after playing just one game in Switzerland in 2020-21 due to complications from a COVID-19 infection. Rossi scored his first North American professional goal playing for the Iowa Wild on Sunday and could wind up being a factor on the big league club if he performs well in the AHL.
Marco Rossi scores his first AHL goal to put @IAWild on the board in #IAvsTEX. Rossi was drafted 9th overall in 2020 by the @mnwild. pic.twitter.com/Qp5f6GJDOL
— American Hockey League (@TheAHL) October 18, 2021
What did they did in the offseason…
Notable Additions: Dmitry Kulikov, Alex Goligoski, Jon Merrill.
Notable Subtractions: Zach Parise, Ryan Suter, Nick Bonino, Brad Hunt, Ian Cole.
It was certainly a wild offseason in Minnesota.
The team was very exciting in 2021, and while they ultimately bowed out in the first round in an intense series that went the distance with the Vegas Golden Knights, the Wild generated quite a bit of optimism for what was ahead.
When the summer rolled around, general manager Bill Guerin fully leaned into the present and the future and did away with the past. He made the surprising move to buy out the final four seasons of the massive, 13-year deals that Ryan Suter and Zach Parise inked with the team back in 2012.
Apparently, getting rid of Suter and Parise meant “removing the two primary obstacles to locker room harmony.” Beyond that, it also opened up roughly $10 million in salary cap room for Guerin to operate with, and he used it to lock up some key contributors for the long haul.
Joel Eriksson Ek, who had a breakout season in 2020-21 by scoring 19 goals and 30 points in 56 games, was handed an eight-year deal with a $5.25 million cap hit. That might seem like a lot for a guy whose career-high in goals before last year was eight, but if Eriksson Ek’s breakout was legit, the Wild will have themselves a very team-friendly deal.
And then there was Kaprizov, who won the Calder Trophy for the NHL’s top rookie.
There was speculation that Kaprizov would take the Artemi Panarin route and seek a two-year deal that would walk him right to unrestricted free agency, but the Wild wound up getting him signed to a five-year deal with a $9 million cap hit. It’s a heavy investment for a guy who has only 55 NHL games under his belt, but the Wild are comfortable with Kaprizov being the guy to build around.
Minnesota isn’t finished locking up their young core just yet. Next summer, Kevin Fiala, who scored 20 goals in 50 games in 2021, will be a restricted free agent. The challenge Guerin will have to navigate is that Suter and Parise’s buyouts go from costing the team $2,371,794 each to $6,371,794 each in 2022-23, so the Wild will have a tighter salary cap situation to dance around.
One bold prediction…
Kirill Kaprizov will prove he’s more than worth his big contract when he breaks Marian Gaborik’s franchise record of 83 points in a season set back in 2007-08.
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