Pre/Post Game Minnesota Wild Banter

[scsavre]

We are definitley a team with very little......trade deadline is Monday. Are we gonna do anything

[spearchucker]

Koivu and Brodziak being out was very evident last night. They still had a chance until the empty netter at the end.

[knoppers]

why pull the goalie with 1:28 remaining, and already on the power play, very dumb coaching if you ask me. since shorthanded, there is no icing when flinging pucks at the net. I can see pulling the goalie with about 30 seconds remaining, but 1:28?

[knoppers]

big win, we needed the two points.

[Rippinlip]

big win, we needed the two points.

+1, my man Stoner put us ahead briefly, glad we got the 2 points!

[10,000 Casts]

Theodore with 46 saves! The wild were lucky to steal the 2 pts in that one..

[spearchucker]

+1, my man Stoner put us ahead briefly, glad we got the 2 points!

Stoner has to be one of the most improved this year. He played well last year, but this year he is a consistent D man. A great buy at 500K.

[scsavre]

Big win, would have been nice to not have given up the point.. But getting a point at all was god for this team. We were outplayed pretty good.

[OnAFly]

This is why I hate the west coast games. With a 6 month old in the house, I'm pretty much sleeping by 9:30.

I wish I could have seen this one.

[hanronson]

Great game. Awesome goal by Butch and Jose stood on his head.

[10,000 Casts]

Khudobin traded to Boston for a D man that has played in 2 NHL games and a guy that is currently in the Sweedish Elite League..

Jeff Penner - 5'10" 190 defenseman... maybe they are thinking of putting him out there with Spurgeon... That would sure intimidate alot of teams..

Mikko Lehtonen - 6'5" 205 right wing... maybe put him on the Koivu line so we can have a Mikko-Mikko-Antti line..

Well guys, I would have to say that we got screwed here.. Too bad, I liked Khudobin but I guess he was a free agent at the end of the year so they just wanted to get something...

[Bear55]

We have plenty of goalies in our system so I am not too worried about this move. The Finn is kind of an interesting player, 23 years old, big skilled and putting up good number in the AHL and the Swedish Elite League the past couple of years. Sound like he is a goal scorer with NHL talent but shy's away from the physical play. He needs some work but clearly worth taking a chance on.

[OnAFly]

Sounded like we were going to let him walk, them Boston offered up a couple guys. Might as well take it. I was actually happy they got something for the plethora of goalies they have.

Mikko sounds like he could be worth something. Scores goals. We could use that, even if he doesn't like to crush people over the boards.

We just lost to Chicago. Bouchard desperately tried to keep the puck into the zone and inadvertently passed right to Kane (I think) would went in on a short handed 2 on 1 and Hossa put it away. Nail in the coffin. For tonight at least. This one hurts.

[MinnesnowtaWild]

Yeah we definitely didn't get screwed...we have tons of goalies in the pipeline. Backstrom, Harding, Theodore, Hackett, Enstrom, Gustavson, and I think maybe another.

Khudobin was awesome and he was a real character, but the guy was always out of position and even though he played great for the few games in the NHL he had too many positional issues. I will miss him though.

[10,000 Casts]

agreed that if they were going to let him walk it is a good thing we got something.. I liked Khudobin and I think he will be a solid backup in a couple years..

on another note.. Havlat drives me absolute nuts.. he may lead the team in pts but how many goals have we given up because is was floating around and lazily following the play. The wild gave up 2 goals tonight because he was doing that...

[JimBuck]

If we could have played the way we did in the 3rd period all night, it may have been a different game. We spent the majority of the night flipping the puck into the neutral zone and offense was nearly non-existent. Scott going after Staubitz was just unfair but I gotta say it was good seeing big John swingin' again.

[spearchucker]

Wild looked terrible last night. Didn't win any of the puck battles.

As for the Khudobin trade I think we came out well. He got lucky in his games with good D play. He doesn't slide post to post, he goes wall to wall. There were saves that Zanon was making while he was flopping around out by the faceoff circle.

[OnAFly]

JimBuck - +1 We played 1/3 of a game last night.

As for Havlat. I seem to remember a guy by the name of Gaborik that played like that. Then when he left everyone thought the sky was falling.

In Havlat's defense, he needed to take chances in the third doing things like that. We needed three goals to keep the game alive. This is from a team that doesn't score much. It was time to start floating. As for the second, well, the whole team was pretty bad there too.

[10,000 Casts]

Chicago played the Coyotes the night before and the Wild hadn't played since Friday so as usual, the team that played the night before comes out swinging in the first period or 2 then the gasses out in the 3rd.. Chicago is a much better team and Havlat's lazyness killed us. I hate his style of play, the only way he is a superstar is if he is playing with superstars. Good to have on the PP and he hasn't been hurt nearly as much as Gaborik but imo, he costs us too many games.

[OnAFly]

He does take chances sometimes, but he'll make a good defensive play (usually in the neutral zone) to stop rushes sometimes too.

I think our biggest problem when we get into periods like the first two last night is flipping the puck out of the zone. We send it right back to the defense and we wind up back in our zone. We can't do this. The Wild need to be better at breaking out of their zone. Dump and chase only works going into the offensive zone, not out of the defensive zone.

[spearchucker]

Dump and chase only works if you chase down and get the puck too.

[OnAFly]

True, but crossing that red line is the first step. And I don't mean our goal line (though sometimes I think they've confused this part of it).

[Bear55]

Havlat is terrible, trade him for Boogaard straight up!

[spearchucker]

Havlat is terrible, trade him for Boogaard straight up!

I don't think I would go that far.

[Bear55]

Come Boogy has 2 points in a total of 22 games this season, just imagine his production if he got the playing time and pp time of Havlat, he would be unstoppable!!!

Only kidding of course. I like Havlat, we need him. I was hoping Mikko was going to step it up a little this season after that big contract he signed, he's doing ok but not for the $$$ we are going to pay him next year. Thankfully Havlat decided to step it up and the be the offensive leader of this year.