The Minnesota Wild have had a reputation for being a mediocre team for most of their existence in the NHL. Good enough to get into the playoffs, but not good enough to go far. While it is always fun to watch the team you like consistently make it to the playoffs, it also means that they are consistently drafting in the middle of the first round and unable to acquire the elite talent present at the front of the draft. Somehow that has changed for the Wild, who are somehow able to perennially have a player knocking on the door of the Calder Trophy ever since Kirill Kaprizov won the first one in franchise history in 2021.
The rise of the Wild’s prospect pool to the top of the NHL in recent years is well-documented, but not really understood as they have only had a single top-ten draft pick in the last ten years. There is no reason that a team should be able to make the playoffs every single season and still add elite talent to an already stocked cupboard, and yet the Wild have done just that. The trend continues with Brock Faber and Marco Rossi both garnering Calder Trophy attention this season, but a lot of it starts with putting the rookies in the right places to find success once they hit the bright lights of the NHL stage.
Everything Starts With Kaprizov
The Wild owe a lot to Kaprizov, perhaps more than any other NHL team owes to a single player. Now and then a late-round draft pick ends up becoming a franchise player, but it is extremely rare and impossible to predict until it happens. The Wild found that diamond in Kaprizov during the fifth round of the 2015 Draft. It is easy now to look back and wonder why it took so long for him to be picked, but at the time he was a very small, fairly skilled player that most people considered may never make the jump to North America.
Related: Minnesota Wild Prospect Report: Stramel, Öhgren, & Wallstedt
A re-invented Wild team with new general manager Bill Guerin at the helm convinced Kaprizov to finally make the leap to North America when he was 24 years old, allowing him time to grow his game and become comfortable in his own skin before moving to a different continent. His 51-point season in just 55 games was enough for the rookie (as he still was a rookie by NHL standards) to win the Calder Trophy. Since that point, the Wild have started to see an influx of talent into their lineup every season that is slowly building them into a team that has all the makings of a true contender.
Boldy’s Injury Cost Him the Calder
After Kaprizov became a full-time NHLer, there was a pair of names with some massive hype surrounding them: Matt Boldy and Marco Rossi. The pair of electric first-round picks for the Wild were both among the highest the team had ever drafted, so the expectations were high for both of them. Despite fans being desperate to see them hit center stage, Boldy, taken 12th overall in 2019, would go on to finish two more seasons at Boston College, play a massive role at the 2021 World Junior Championship and produce 18 points in 14 games with the Iowa Wild in the American Hockey League (AHL).
After all of that success, he was basically pencilled into the Wild’s lineup for the 2021-22 season, but a broken ankle in preseason waylaid those plans. Once Boldy was healed, he was not thrown directly into the NHL, but instead resumed his time in the AHL for another 10-game stint before finally getting a call-up in January. He used his time in the AHL to get his game back and took that promotion and never let it go.
He produced 15 goals and 24 points in the remaining 47 games that season, putting him on pace for 68 points over a full 82-game season. That just so happens to be more points than any other Calder candidate that season. It’s impossible to know if he would have continued that pace, dropped off, or even exceeded it, but if he would’ve had a full season, it is likely he would’ve at least been a finalist.
Gustavsson Just Failed to Meet Eligability
Everyone who thinks about Wild goaltending immediately is drawn to Jesper Wallstedt, but don’t forget that in the 2022-23 season a then-24-year-old Filip Gustavsson was just three games past being eligible for the Calder Trophy. By playing nine games for the Ottawa Senators in 2020-21, he exceeded the following rule for Calder eligibility:
“To be eligible for the Calder Memorial Trophy, a player cannot have played more than 25 games in any single preceding season nor in six or more games in each of any two preceding seasons in any major professional league. Beginning in 1990-91, a player must not have attained his 26th birthday by Sept.15 of the season in which he is eligible.”
Calder Memorial Trophy, Records.NHL.com
The Wild acquired Gustavsson in a one-for-one trade and although he had a rocky start, they effectively eased him into NHL play, gave him an elite mentor in Marc-Andre Fleury and by the end of the season was earning Vezina Trophy attention with his 22 wins, .931 save percentage (SV%) and 2.10 goals-against average (GAA). Matty Beniers of the Seattle Kraken had a fantastic campaign to win the Calder Trophy last season, but if Gustavsson hadn’t played those three extra games (thanks Ottawa), he would have likely been at the top of the conversation.
Faber & Rossi Had Different Paths
Jump into the current 2023-24 season and you will find not one, but two youngsters on the Wild taking the league by storm in a year that is flush with elite rookies. The older of the two is the Wild’s ninth overall pick in 2020, Marco Rossi. Rossi is a unique case as he missed an entire year due to complications that arose from COVID, but it was the patience that the Wild showed post-COVID that allowed him to flourish.
Rossi currently sits second in both goals and points by a rookie in the NHL with 10 goals and 17 points. The 22-year-old has had a very rough path to his current top-six center position, but the Wild gave him all the time, resources, and guidance that he needed to get there. Last season, after collecting just one point in 19 games, the Wild were not afraid to send him back to the AHL to get more experience and work with him over the offseason to strengthen the weak spots in his game. The result is a young center that looks primed to have a fantastic NHL career.
In stark contrast to Rossi is the newest defensive phenom: Brock Faber. Faber, at just 21 years old, looks like a veteran defender with both powerplay and penalty kill upside. He walked right out of the University of Minnesota and straight onto the roster without any AHL time required. He has looked comfortable in the NHL from his very first game and was dropped right into playoff action with only two games under his belt. Different players have different needs to become the best version of themselves, and the Wild have been great at filling those needs for their youngsters.
It Doesn’t End Here
The best part of all of this is that the Wild are only getting started. Next season there is a very high possibility they introduce the NHL to the elite talent that is Wallstedt, whom they have been baking down in Iowa for the last two seasons. He will likely be joined in short order by Marat Khusnutdinov, Danila Yurov, and Liam Ohgren within the next couple of seasons.
The key thing to remember with all of these young men is that the Wild have been doing a phenomenal job at placing them where they need to be to develop, and only then are they set loose on the NHL stage. It is much better to wait an extra season and watch your favorite prospects tear up the league than it is to introduce them too fast and have them lose all confidence in themselves.