NHL offseasons often reveal one or two teams that make the biggest proverbial splashes in an attempt to launch their franchise into the upper echelon of Stanley Cup contenders. It has been noted hundreds of times that the team that made the biggest buys in the summer of 2012 was the Minnesota Wild. Identical 13-year, ...
Corey Crawford Answers The Bell The Chicago Blackhawks became the second Western Conference team to advance to the second round of the Stanley Cup playoffs by defeating the Minnesota Wild in five games. Despite Minnesota’s starter Niklas Backstrom going down with injury in the Game 1 warm-ups, Josh Harding filled in valiantly forcing overtime in ...
Niklas Backstrom, Josh Harding and Darcy Kuemper probably won’t decide who starts, who is on the bench and who is in the press box in Thursday night’s Game 5 against the Chicago Blackhawks by racing for empty chairs. The reality is perhaps more concerning. It may simply be decided by whoever is physically able to play ...
It has been, dare I say, a wild beginning to the Minnesota/Chicago first round playoff series. Niklas Backstrom’s freak lower-body injury during warm ups prior to Game 1 seemed to spell doom for Minnesota, but Josh Harding has performed admirably after being pressed into duty. Throughout the season, a Wild offense that has starved for ...
The Chicago Blackhawks are prepping for Game 4 Wednesday and they know they are facing a fired up Minnesota team. After Chicago had taken the first two games of the series at home they headed to Minnesota in the enviable position of being up 2-0 in the series. Sunday afternoon we were introduced to a ...
Pre-season projection: Playoff team Final team record: 26-19-3 (8th in Western Conference) Flip a coin. The Minnesota Wild made the playoffs for the first time in five years; they almost played themselves out with a 5-6-1 finish, blowing their shot at the division. They scratched out critical season-ending tilts with the Los Angeles Kings and ...
One of the more controversial additions to the new NHL collective bargaining agreement, the league will allow all 30 teams to correct past contractual mistakes by offering them two buyouts over the ensuing two off-seasons. With the NHL salary cap shrinking from over $70 million this season to a reported $64.3 million next year, these ...
A little known goaltending prospect Darcy Kuemper provided the Minnesota Wild with a major bright spot on Tuesday night. The Wild’s offense mustered only one goal in yet another toothless effort, but 22-year old Kuemper made 28 saves to keep his team in the game against Northwest division leaders Vancouver. It may ultimately have been ...
It’s been a rough couple of days for Wild fans. For those of you who don’t know, Minnesota Wild backstopper Josh Harding, drafted 38th overall in 2002, has been diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis (MS). The lockout doesn’t matter anymore. When something as bad as this hits the family, disputes are put into perspective and ultimately ...
Until recent years Minnesota has had a dearth of talent in their goaltending prospect pool. Of the six goaltenders drafted in Doug Risebrough’s regime, only two spent much time with the Wild or in their farm system—Josh Harding and Anton Khudobin. The others—Barry Brust, Miroslav Kopriva, Kristofer Westblom and Niko Hovinen—never fit into the franchise’s ...
