Just a couple of weeks ago, the Minnesota Wild were the best team in the National Hockey League, mowing down opponents like like long blades of grass on a honey-do summer Sunday. But injuries have completely derailed their run atop the Western Conference.
Now, they are losers of four-straight, and five of their last seven, which has pushed the Wild down to third place in the West, where they sit 5 points behind Central Division rival, Winnipeg, who destroyed Minnesota 6-0, over the weekend.
Minnesota Wild injury updates: Filip Gustavsson and Yakov Trenin back — Joel Eriksson Ek still out
But there is some good injury news coming out of St. Paul, to start the week. On Monday, one day after reassigning Jesper Wallstedt back to Iowa, the Minnesota Wild announced that Yakov Trenin was being activated off of injured reserve.
Meanwhile, Michael Russo (The Athletic) reports that Filip Gustavsson is expected to start in net tonight vs the Chicago Blackhawks. The 27-year-old former 2nd round pick has missed the past five games with a mysterious lower-body injury.
The #mnwild has activated forward Yakov Trenin from Injured Reserve.
— Minnesota Wild PR (@mnwildPR) December 23, 2024
Since Fleury worked with the scratches, looks like Gus returns tonight https://t.co/qb5UrrdtAG
— Michael Russo (@RussoHockey) December 23, 2024
Unfortunately, the update on center Joel Eriksson Ek — who has been out of the lineup since December 3, when he suffered a lower-body injury of his own vs the Vancouver Canucks — was not as positive. He’ll miss tonight’s game vs the Chicago Blackhawks. According to Michael Russo (The Athletic), the Minnesota Wild are hoping to get Ek back on Friday vs the Dallas.
Since Gus Bus has been out with injury, the Wild are 1-4-0 and they’ve allowed 3.4 goals per game, including two losses where they allowed five or more pucks into the net. How drastically will that change, now that he is back? Tonight is a good game to test the waters, vs one of the worst teams in the NHL, before a much more difficult matchup on Friday vs the Stars.
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Yakov Trenin, who was signed by the Minnesota Wild this offseason, has played in 29 games. He’s scored two goals and helped on one more. He’s averaging 13:37 minutes of ice time per game (+4). Eriksson Ek, on the other hand, is desperately missed. Prior to his injury, the 27-year-old was averaging 19:06 TOI. The assistant captain has potted 5 goals on the season and assisted on 8 others.