The Minnesota Wild activated F Ryan Hartman from the injured list and he played his first game since October 30th. They reassigned F Sammy Walker to the American Hockey League’s Iowa Wild to make room for the Hart Man. We assumed Ryan Hartman would just put in the same spot in the lineup that Sammy Walker was in, on the right wing with left wing Matt Boldy & center Freddy Gaudreau but we’ll see.
The Wild were looking to extend their winning streak to 5 against the Ottawa Senators but Ottawa were looking to do the same thing as they had also won 4 straight.
Alright. Enough words. Let’s…
Drop the ClutterPuck!!!
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Here’s how the teams lined up:
Minnesota Wild
Scratched: Alex Goligoski
Injured: Brandon Duhaime (upper body)
Status report
Hartman will play his first game since Oct. 30 after missing the past 21 because of an upper-body injury.
Play with Hart, Man!
Ottawa Senators
Scratched: Dillon Heatherington, Jacob Lucchini
Injured: Josh Norris (shoulder), Artem Zub (jaw), Mathieu Joseph (lower body), Tim Stutzle (shoulder)
Just a few Senators on the mend.
Game Recap
Happy Holiday, ClutterPuckers!!!
Kappa Klaus!!!
Goal – Minnesota Wild – Kirill Kaprizov(19) from Mats Zuccarello(22) & Sam Steel(6)
The Ottawa Senators were guilty of puckwatching here. Ottawa D Nick Holden checked to see where Kirill Kaprizov was when Sam Steel dropped the puck back to Mats Zuccarello. Holden then checked the location of the puck. Kirill Kaprizov stopped quickly to have some more space between him & Holden to be open for a shot. Holden took a 2nd peak at Kaprizov but that was at almost the exact same time the puck was being sent to him so he was late getting there and he made a weak attempt to block the shot by not going down to his knees to take away the low shot. Get down and block a shot for your goalie.
Kirill knew he was there so he kept the shot low to get it through and Ottawa G Anton Forsberg actually got a piece of it.
Ottawa F Mark Kastelic (#47) was a big spectator on this goal. Alex DeBrincat helped force Sam Steel to get rid of the puck then he skated away from it and was actually not facing the puck like he was going to go change. Wow!*
*We broke down this goal further in a Film Session – COMING SOON!
1-0 Wild!
Almost the same exact thing happened at the start of the 2nd period…
Gus made a couple of great saves then Kirill got a scoring chance. The rebound went to Sam Steel at the left of the net and he passed it across to Zuccarello for a pretty easy goal and
the Wild are up 2-0!
Senators D Thomas Chabot sent a stretch pass to Alex DeBrincat at the Wild’s blue line but Wild D Jonas Brodin was on him quickly so DeBrincat tried to make a “cute” backhand pass to linemate Drake Batherson that became a turnover because the pass was off the mark. Wild D Jared Spurgeon quickly sent the puck up to Sam Steel and he saw Kirill Kaprizov on the outside Chabot so he put a pass off the right boards so Kirill could skate into it and get past Chabot for a scoring chance. Chabot caught up to Kirill to force him to make a quicker shot but he still got it off and forced G Anton Forsberg to make a save off his right pad which created a juicy rebound that came right to a driving Sam Steel but he passed up the shot to give Mats Zuccarello an easy shot at a gaping net.
That’s some lazy play by the Ottawa forwards. They’re on the back end of a back-to-back. How much slack do you give for that, though?
*With the assist on the 2nd goal, Minnesota Wild F Kirill Kaprizov now has 200 points in his career and he did it in just 167 games, the fewest of any Wild player in the history of the franchise and the 4th fewest among active players and, as you see below, 6 games fewer than some player named Connor McDavid.
CONGRATS, KIRILL!!! We can’t wait for the next 200 points!!!
Questionable Delay of Game penalty on Dumba for running into the net and knocking it off its moorings but the Wild killed it off against a scorching Ottawa Power Play (9 for their last 22 over their last 4 games).
Shortly afterwards, Kirill fed Spurgeon and he went upper right on the backhand. Otherwise known as Backhand Shelf!
3-0 Wild!
Another turnover at the offensive blue line turns into a goal for the Wild. It’s hard to believe the Senators have won 4 in a row with this kind of lazy play and bad decisions. More often than not, simple math should make your decision on if you should be aggressive or just dump it in.
Before Shane Pinto gets to the puck, it’s already 2-on-4 then he had trouble handling it and his teammate thought he was going to send it deep then Pinto was knocked down. For some reason, Ottawa F Rourke Chartier is still aggressive even though his team doesn’t have control of the puck and are still outnumbered so Sam Steel just chips the puck over the blue line and it’s 2-on-2 with Kirill Kaprizov & the puck going down center ice with Marcus Foligno on his left and Jared Spurgeon sees the chance to make it an odd-rush so he flies up the right side past the defense. Kaprizov took the puck to the side on his forehand and the defender (Travis Hamonic) tried to make a quick stop to close the gap on Kirill but Kirill was still able to get the puck between his legs to Spurgeon and he made a quick deke the a quicker little backhand to the upper right for his 3rd goal of the season.
It took until 5 minutes into the 3rd period but Ottawa finally got on the board with a tipped shot from F Mark Kastelic. Tipped shots have to be a nightmare for goalies. They can’t play a tip and it can be tipped up, down or to either side. Ughh!
3-1 Wild
The Wild had held Ottawa to just 12 shots on goal through the 1st 2 periods while 20 shots themselves but Ottawa definitely brought an aggressive push in the 3rd period.
On their 24th shot, they had an extra attacker and that definitely helped them when Spurgeon blocked a shot but didn’t know it was at his feet so Drake Batherson got to it and took a shot that G Filip Gustavsson saved but gave up a rebound and Brady Tkachuk was there to pass it to his right to Claude Giroux for an easy shot into an empty net and the Senators were within 1 with 1:40 remaining in regulation.
3-2 Wild
A minute later, Drake Batherson had the puck behind the Wild net and sent it around the corner to Alex DeBrincat and he tried to fake like he was going to play it but he let it go and Wild F Joel Eriksson Ek read the play, took the puck away then chipped it past the pinching defenseman. Claude Giroux was easily going to get to the puck before Sam Steel and he probably could’ve played it and skated behind his net to reset and make one final push to tie the game with 30 seconds left but he tried to quickly & blindly send it off the far boards and out of the zone. Wild F Freddy Gaudreau kept the puck in the zone. Shane Pinto was going hard to get to Gaudreau but lost an edge when he tried to stop when Freddy cut back to open ice. Freddy then fired a shot into the upper center of the net to put the Wild up 2 goals again.
4-2 Wild & a 5-Game Winning Streak!
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Final
Ottawa Senators 2 | 4 Minnesota Wild
Goals
MN:
- Kirill Kaprizov(19), 2. Mats Zuccarello(14), 3. Jared Spurgeon(3), 4. Freddy Gaudreau(8)
OTT:
- Mark Kastelic(3), 2. Claude Giroux(14)
*PPG=Power-Play Goal, ENG=Empty-Net Goal
Assists
MN:
- Mats Zuccarello(22), Sam Steel(6), 2. Sam Steel(7), Kirill Kaprizov(22), 3. Kirill Kaprizov(23), Marcus Foligno(7), 4. Unassisted
OTT:
- Travis Hamonic(3), Parker Kelly(3), 2. Brady Tkachuk(23), Drake Batherson(19)
Goalies
MN:
Filip Gustavsson – 26 Saves on 28 Shots on Goal, .929 Save%, 7th Win (6 straight wins, too)
OTT:
Anton Forsberg – 19 Saves on 22 Shots on Goal, .864 Save%, 8th Loss
Game Notes
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Why didn’t the Senators start former Wild G Cam Talbot?
He had started 4 straight over the last 8 days including a 6-3 win over Detroit the night before this game and very rarely does a team go with the same goal for back-to-back games.
It seems strange that they wouldn’t put their backup goalie in for the game against a struggling Detroit team that was 3-5-2 in their last 10 instead of the second game of a back-to-back against a team that was 8-2 over their last 10 games especially when their number 1 goalie was a former Wild goalie that left under somewhat weird circumstances.
- “The division games take precedent over the personal rivalry,” Talbot said. “I told them whatever decision they made, I understand. But they knew I wanted to play Minnesota.” – The Athletic – Joe Smith
**
AND… apparently Cam Talbot “never wanted to leave” Minnesota.
Cam Talbot was traded after his agent spouted that Wild GM Bill Guerin had “a lot to think about” after re-signing G Marc-Andre Fleury to a 2-year/$7M deal.
A few days later Cam Talbot was traded to Ottawa for current Wild backup G Filip Gustavsson as Guerin had a change of heart because he didn’t want any unnecessary drama in his locker room and especially with his goaltending duo.
An article from The Athletic MN (author Joe Smith) that came out on Saturday has Cam Talbot saying he never wanted to leave Minnesota. He also said he wanted to sign an extension with the Wild and eventually retire in the Twin Cities.
Is that where the disconnect happened? Wild GM Bill Guerin maybe didn’t want to sign him to an extension or a multi-year extension given that has Fleury signed for 2 years and they believe their future #1 goalie, Jesper Wallstedt, is already in the AHL playing his first season as a pro and his first season in North America. Bill Guerin has said often they don’t want to rush their prospects. They have to win a spot and force their way onto the NHL roster.
Talbot was caught off guard by the “drama” comments from Bill Guerin thinking it was more about drama from him but it was probably more about the drama of the situation knowing that he wasn’t happy* with being the 2nd fiddle in the playoffs because of Fleury’s playoff success.
*Was the “drama” about Cam Talbot’s agent? or his wife who wasn’t happy with coach Dean Evason saying it was an “easy decision” to go with Marc-Andre Fleury in the playoffs. He meant both goalies made it easy on him by understanding the decision.
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Is Sam Steel a #1 Center?
We’ll have to get into this more soon but the above tweet says a lot about what Sam Steel has done since becoming the Wild’s #1 center.
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Next up:
The Wild go out on the road for 2 games in Cali at the Anaheim Ducks on Wednesday night at 9pm on Bally Sports North Plus and Thursday night at the San Jose Sharks at 9:30pm on Bally Sports North before their 4-day holiday break.
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