Minnesota Wild

What the Quant Says

251 goals, 21st in the league, on the 26th-best rate of chance creation at even strength — 2.399 expected goals per 60. Six clubs in hockey created less. This is not an attack; it is a defensive club that scores enough.

At five-on-five Minnesota took 49.6 per cent of the shot attempts, 20th, and 51.3 per cent of the expected goals, 12th. The gap between those two numbers is the shape of the whole team: fewer attempts than the opposition, better ones.

And it scored 159 goals at five-on-five against an expectation of 151.4 — a surplus of 7.6, 12th in the league. Above average at finishing, which is where the twenty-first-place scoring comes from on twenty-sixth-place chance creation.

The power play was 4th in the league at 8.700 expected goals per 60, over the second-most power-play time in hockey. Two hundred and fifty-one goals is a modest total and the man advantage is doing a great deal of the work inside it.

Kirill Kaprizov scored 46 goals and 96 points in 75 games, nineteen of the goals on the power play, converting at 16.6 per cent — his career rate across 278 games is 16.26, so this is the player rather than the season. His ice went 72-56 against an expectation of 58.60-46.73, thirteen goals of finishing above what the chances were worth.

Matt Boldy had 29 goals and 69 points at 22 and Joel Eriksson Ek had 30 goals and 64 points, and both of them finished a long way above expectation as well — Boldy by eight, Eriksson Ek by twelve. Mats Zuccarello had 51 assists at 36. Four forwards produced almost all of it and the fifth-best forward here is Ryan Hartman with 45 points.

What the Scout Says

Four men and a long silence behind them.

Kirill Kaprizov is 5-10 and 202 and shoots at 16.26 per cent for a career. 410 attempts at a median of 26 feet with 38 per cent from inside twenty. He is the shot and he is also the entry — nobody else here carries the puck into the zone with any conviction.

Joel Eriksson Ek took 347 attempts at a median of 15 feet, with 55 per cent of them from inside twenty. Of the ten men in this edition who shot from closer, only Zach Hyman and Chris Kreider took more. He is 6-3 and stands where it hurts.

Matt Boldy is 23 with 75 goals in 203 games and Marco Rossi is 5-9, 182 pounds, and scored 21 in his first full season. Mats Zuccarello is 5-8, 37, undrafted, and has 438 career assists. After those five it is checking forwards.

What the Quant Says

Minnesota allowed 2.283 expected goals per 60 at even strength, second in the league. Only Carolina suppressed chances at a lower rate. That is a genuinely elite defensive structure and it is the best thing this organisation has.

It conceded 263 goals, 19th. Between those two facts is the entire season, and almost none of it belongs to the skaters.

Brock Faber played all 82 games at 24:58 a night in his first season, at 21. Only five defencemen in this edition who played forty games took more ice. He had 8 goals and 39 assists for 47 points, and his ice went 66-65 against an expectation of 59.04-57.83. He was drafted by Los Angeles and Minnesota acquired him in the deal that sent Kevin Fiala the other way.

Jonas Brodin was plus-22 in 62 games at 23:22 with his ice at 52-39 against 46.42-41.26 — the only regular defenceman here on the right side of the goaltending. Twelve seasons, 803 games, all of them for this club.

Jake Middleton's ice went 50-70 against an expectation of 50.37-54.02. He finished exactly level with the chances at one end and sixteen goals underwater at the other, which is the worst mark on the roster and not a defensive failure. Zach Bogosian is 34, has 848 games and 778 penalty minutes, and took 17:53 a night on the second pair.

What the Scout Says

The second-best chance suppression in hockey, and it does not belong to any one man.

Brock Faber is 6-1 and 200 and played every game at 24:58. Right-handed, mobile, and already trusted with the assignment; 47 points in a first season is the by-product rather than the point. He was born in Maple Grove, Minnesota.

Jonas Brodin is 6-2 and 196 and has 803 games of it. He does not hit and he does not score and he has been the best defensive defenceman on this roster for a decade. Jake Middleton is 6-3 and 219 with 244 career penalty minutes and takes the physical half of the top four.

Zach Bogosian is 6-3 and 231, was third overall in 2008, and has 778 penalty minutes. Jon Merrill is 32 with 612 games. The bottom pair is old and cheap and the club has Declan Chisholm at 24 behind it.

What the Quant Says

The club's goaltending came in 19 goals worse than the chances it faced, 28th in the league. In front of the second-best chance suppression in hockey. Four clubs did worse, and one of them was Tampa Bay, who made the playoffs anyway.

Filip Gustavsson went 20-18-4 with an .8995 and a 3.06 in 45 games, facing 1,283 shots. The season before he had gone .9309 in 39 games — a fall of thirty-one points of save percentage in one year. He is 26, a second-round pick, and his career line across 111 games is a .9120.

Marc-Andre Fleury went 17-15-5 with an .8949 and a 2.98 in 40 games, facing 1,056. He is 39, first overall in 2003, and has 1,025 games, 561 wins and 75 shutouts across twenty seasons at a career .9120.

Minnesota is one of only three clubs in this edition where every goaltender who played twenty-five games finished under .900. The other two were Ottawa, who were 30th at this, and Tampa Bay, who were 32nd and had Andrei Vasilevskiy.

Of the fifteen skaters on this roster who played four hundred five-on-five minutes, thirteen finished on the wrong side of the goaltending. That is not a distribution; it is a condition.

What the Scout Says

The 28th-best crease in the league behind the second-best defence, and the club has run it back.

Filip Gustavsson is 6-2 and 184 and plays a quick, deep game that relies on getting square early rather than covering ground. It produced a .9309 in 2022-23 and an .8995 the year after, and 111 career games is not enough to say which of those is him.

Marc-Andre Fleury is 6-2 and 185 and 39 years old. Twenty seasons, 1,025 games, 561 wins, 75 shutouts, a career .9120, and three Stanley Cups. He has now finished under .910 in four of the last five seasons.

Two goaltenders, both under .900, both back. This is a defensive team with nobody in the net, and nothing else about it will matter until that changes.

What the Quant Says

4th in the league at 8.700 expected goals per 60, over 5:40 a night, which is the second-most power-play time in hockey. Only Ottawa spent longer a man up.

Kirill Kaprizov scored 19 power-play goals and has 58 in 278 career games. Joel Eriksson Ek scored 12 and Matt Boldy 10. Three men account for forty-one of them.

The unit is built around Kaprizov's shot from the left circle and Eriksson Ek standing in the blue paint, and it works. On a club that creates at the twenty-sixth rate at even strength, the fourth-best power play with the second-most time is doing structural work rather than decorative work.

What the Scout Says

Fourth in the league by rate and second by volume, which is the one thing here that is unambiguously working.

Kirill Kaprizov's 19 power-play goals came from the left circle and there is no mystery about it. Joel Eriksson Ek's 12 came from the paint. The unit puts a shooter on one side, a body in front, and Mats Zuccarello on the wall to find whichever is open — 51 assists at 36 is what that role produces.

Matt Boldy added 10 and Brock Faber scored 3 from the point. It is a young unit with two old men on it, and no obvious replacement for either.

What the Quant Says

25th in the league at 7.481 expected goals against per 60, over 5:20 a night, the sixth-most shorthanded time in hockey. Both halves of that are bad: they were down a man more than almost anybody and defended it worse than almost anybody.

This is the contradiction on the page. A club with the second-best even-strength chance suppression in the league has the twenty-fifth-best kill, and it takes the sixth-most penalties' worth of time doing it.

Marcus Foligno has 808 career penalty minutes in 798 games, Ryan Hartman 577 in 580, and Zach Bogosian 778 in 848. There is a great deal of penalty-taking on this roster and no unit capable of absorbing it.

What the Scout Says

Twenty-fifth by rate at the sixth-highest volume, in front of the second-best five-on-five defence in hockey. Something here does not fit.

Marcus Foligno is 6-3 and 226 with 808 career penalty minutes and Yakov Trenin is 6-2 and 201 with 164 in 299 games, arriving from Colorado to do this job. Jonas Brodin and Jake Middleton take the defensive pair.

The personnel is right and the result is 25th. Either the structure a man down is wrong or the goaltending is doing it, and given that the goaltending was 28th overall, the second explanation is the simpler one.