Wild Injury Situation Shows Signs of Improvement

The Minnesota Wild are battling through one of their toughest stretches of the season, with injuries hitting the team particularly hard since mid-November.

The latest blow? Star winger Kirill Kaprizov had to be moved to long-term injured reserve due to salary cap constraints.

But there’s finally some good news for Wild fans. Top defenseman Brock Faber is set to return Saturday against Nashville after sitting out four games with an upper-body injury. Jakub Lauko is also ready to go after coming off injured reserve Thursday.

The team’s injury list remains pretty long, though.

Neither Kaprizov nor team captain Jared Spurgeon will travel for the upcoming road games. Spurgeon’s still recovering from a nasty slew foot incident on New Year’s Eve courtesy of Nashville’s Zachary L’Heureux.

The absences don’t stop there. Jonas Brodin is stuck at home nursing a lower-body injury, and Marcus Johansson just landed on IR with a concussion. That’s four key players missing from the lineup.

To fill these gaps, the Wild have called up three players from their AHL team in Iowa: Brendan Gaunce, Liam Ohgren, and Devin Shore. The moves required some careful salary cap juggling, but they’ve now got about $7.45 million in cap space to work with.

The real challenge? Finding room under the cap when Kaprizov is ready to return, which could be as soon as next week.

Despite all these setbacks, the Wild aren’t doing too badly. They’ve lost three of their last four, sure, but their overall record stands at 27-14-4. The numbers guys give them a 96.5% chance of making the playoffs, and they’ve even got a shot at winning their division for just the second time ever.

The replacement players are trying their best, but they’re not exactly lighting it up. Between the three of them, they’ve managed just one assist this season, with none averaging even 10 minutes of ice time per game.