Canucks vs. Wild Game Day Preview: Wild Things
When the Minnesota Wild signed BFFs Zach Parise and Ryan Suter to similar 13-year, $98 million contracts this off-season, some wondered whether or not owner Craig Leopold had finally lost his mind. Don’t get me wrong. Not that these outrageously big contracts weren’t deserved – Parise is a consistent 30-goal scorer and recorded a career-high 94 points in 2008-2009, and Ryan Suter is one of the top defensemen in the league with an average of over 30 points a season over the last 5 seasons – but Minnesota is still a relatively-small market team and Leopold cried poor not long after the deals. Committing $196 million to 2 players is no small thing.
Courtesy of Brace Hemmelgarn-USA TODAY Sports
Fast forward to today and it seems like the Parise and Suter signings have paid off for the Wild. For starters, business is as ‘good as it’s ever been’ in Minnesota. On the ice, the Wild are now leading the Northwest Division, wrestling top spot again from the Canucks this weekend. And leading the Wild? Parise and Suter, of course.
Parise has found some good chemistry with captain Mikko Koivu and both have 22 points each (Parise has 11 goals). After a bit of a slow start, Suter has hit his stride and leads the team with 23 points (2G-21A).
Tonight’s game, the final meeting for the Canucks and the Wild this season, will be another battle for first place in the Northwest Division. The Canucks do lead the season series 2-1, but were trumped in Minnesota just over a week ago.
Canucks Record
13-8-6, 32 points (2nd in Northwest Division, 7th in Western Conference)
Who’s Hot
Suter has 14 points in his last 10 games and hasn’t gone more than 1 game without a point since February 7, 2013. He is also averaging a league-high 27:16 minutes of ice-time per game.
Alex Edler has 4 points (1G-3A) and is a plus-3 in his last 2 games. Though while his offensive contributions are welcomed by the currently offensively-challenged Canucks, his defensive breakdowns also seem to be more commonplace.
Who’s Not
Dany Heatley is tied for the team’s worst plus/minus with a minus-11 and has only managed 2 assists in his last 5 games and 6 points in his last 12 games.
Quickies
- With David Booth and Zack Kassian out, who replaces them? (Vancouver Province)
About time for a breakout game defensively from Edler, can we overcome the loss of yet two more offensive players?
Hopefully neither will be out for too long, but here’s hoping that when Schroeder comes up from Chicago he can make more of an impact than he did before. With Booth out he could get more minutes on the more offensive lines he’s better suited for.
Couldn’t agree more, Jared. Edler needs to get back to his defensive game and find some consistency. When the defence is playing well it helps the forwards attack more. Canucks need to get back to their game.
Has Edler really had a consistent “defensive game” in his toolkit though? I’ve always found him to be a more defensive version of Jovanovski, but that’s not a more defensive player by any way or shape.
How much of Schroeder making an impact is related to where AV plays him? Do we expect him to contribute when he’s centering a 4th line?