By Jordan Long
The Minnesota Wild have already clinched their spot in the Stanley Cup Playoffs. This marks the 6th year in a row they made the postseason. They will have to try to win a Stanley Cup without their top defenseman, Ryan Suter. He has a fractured fibula which occured Saturday night during the Wild’s 4-1 loss to the Dallas Stars.
Suter plays on the top line for the Wild and logs 26 minutes and 47 seconds of ice time on average. On full strength he is able to poke check the puck away to end scoring chances. Suter hits opponents off the puck allowing the Wild to skate it out of the defensive zone. He blocks shots from the goaltender. When the Wild skate the puck into the offensive zone, Suter will one-time a shot for a goal. He has 6 goals and 45 assists for an impressive 51 points.
On the power play, Suter is the quarterback who sets up the play from the blue line. From there he uses his slap shot or one-timer to score goals. If Suter doesn’t score, he feeds his teammates for goals. On the power play Suter has 1 goal and 22 assists.
The Wild count on him when they are short-handed. They know Suter takes the puck away and will not allow opponents to set up. When that happens, he fires the puck down the ice to kill time off the power play kill. Suter can create short-handed opportunities for the Wild totaling 1 short-handed assist.
The Wild are going to miss his presence in the postseason. They know how valuable Suter is and how large of a loss this will be in the playoffs. The Wild have Matt Dumba who can play in Suter’s spot. He has 12 goals and 34 assists for a total of 46 points. After that, the rest of the defensemen must step-up their game. If they end up going out in the 1st-round, they can’t look back and say the injury to Suter was the difference.
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