Although it’s early, history says the Wild’s playoff hopes are looking grim.
According to Elliot Friedman of Sportsnet – the Michael Russo of Canada – being outside of the playoff picture on Nov. 1 is not an ideal situation to make the playoffs.
Since 2005-06, only six of 48 teams that were at least four points out of the eighth seed have come back to make the postseason. In other words, only 12 percent of those teams made the playoffs.
As of Tuesday, Nov. 7, Minnesota owns a record of 5-6-2 and is four points back of Nashville for the final playoff spot in the Western Conference.
Boudreau has seen this before
The Wild fell to the Boston Bruins on Monday evening and head coach Bruce Boudreau is losing his patience with his team. He called Minnesota’s effort in the first two periods “the most embarrassing two periods I’ve been involved with.”
However, Boudreau has been down this road before. During the 2015-16 season – when Boudreau coached the Anaheim Ducks – Anaheim got off to an even worse start than this year’s Wild. They won just one of their first 10 games.
And yet, that Anaheim team went on a tear and ended up winning the Pacific Division, and finished the regular season with a record of 46-25-11.
What’s wrong with the Wild?
The two things that are killing the Wild right now is their power play and goaltender Devan Dubnyk’s poor start.
Minnesota has just one power-play goal in their last 23 attempts.
And Dubnyk is giving up an average of three goals per game and a save percentage of .907 – which is 16 points lower than the career average he owns since coming to Minnesota.
Backup netminder Alex Stalock has played well when called upon this season and he may end up making more starts if Dubnyk can’t get out of his funk.
After being decimated by injuries, the Wild’s core players have begun to return. Only Charlie Coyle and Zach Parise remain out.
Every team deals with adversity and the Wild are running out of excuses. They need to break out of their tailspin soon or their season could be over.
