Cause for concern: Kirill Kaprizov's injury has potential to derail Wild's season
Minnesota has exceeded expectations thus far, but without their superstar winger they won't be going anywhere.
Nothing seemed out of the ordinary watching Kirill Kaprizov in the Wild’s 4-3 victory over the Chicago Blackhawks on Dec. 23 at Xcel Energy Center. The superstar winger scored his team-leading 23rd goal of the season, had five shots and led all Minnesota forwards with 22 minutes, 9 seconds of ice time as the Wild ended a four-game losing streak before the NHL took its Christmas break.
The Wild have played four games since their return, but Kaprizov has appeared in none of them. He’s dealing with what the team describes as a “lower-body injury” and has been placed on injured reserve. He won’t play in a fifth consecutive game on Saturday as the Wild faces the Carolina Hurricanes in Raleigh.
The Wild, like all NHL teams, are extremely evasive when it comes to injury information. Anything that’s revealed has to be taken with a grain of salt because there’s no telling what’s true and what’s subterfuge.
And that’s what makes the Kaprizov situation concerning.
General manager Bill Guerin met with reporters on Thursday before the Wild’s victory in Washington and, according to The Athletic, said Kaprizov hasn’t started skating but downplayed the issue.
“It’s still just kind of day to day,” Guerin said. “We’re just still trying to work through what he has. The thing is that we don’t want him to come back and push through. He could, but it could make something worse. We need him for the long haul. We don’t just need him for a couple games in January. We need him to get healthy and feel better, so we’re trying to do the right thing and just look at it from the long point of view.”
Indications are that Kaprizov is dealing with a groin injury. We don’t know when Kaprizov told the team’s athletic training staff about the issues and whether he waited until it was a real problem.
The Wild have dealt with injuries for much of the season and are currently without defensemen Jake Middleton and Jared Spurgeon. Middleton has missed 10 games because of a broken finger, and Spurgeon will be out two to three weeks because of a lower body injury suffered when he crashed into the boards on Tuesday night against Nashville.
The injury list also has included center Joel Eriksson Ek, winger Mats Zuccarello, defenseman Jonas Brodin and goalie Flip Gustavsson. All are significant players, but none is as important as Kaprizov.
In his fifth season, Kaprizov has 23 goals and 50 points in 34 games. His goal total puts him in a four-way tie for second in the NHL, four behind Edmonton’s Leon Draisaitl. Kaprizov is tied for eighth in the league in scoring with Vegas’ Jack Eichel. Eichel has played in four more games.
Kaprizov already is fourth on the Wild’s career goal-scoring list with 183 and is fifth with 380 points. His 61 power-play goals put him nine away from passing Zach Parise as the franchise leader. Kaprizov’s skating and puck skills make him special, but nobody works harder than him.
That’s why when it comes to Kaprizov the “kind of day to day” update from Guerin doesn’t provide much comfort. So far, the Wild have weathered the storm of their star’s absence. They are 3-1 without him, including an overtime win at Dallas, a New Year’s Eve victory over Nashville and a shootout win against Washington.
But how long can that continue?
The Wild’s 117 goals put them 16th in the 32-team NHL, and their second-leading scorer is first-line center Marco Rossi with 15 goals. This Wild team works harder than many of the past, but it’s Kaprizov’s ability to dazzle that often puts them over the top.
The good news for the Wild is that their fantastic start to the season will buy them some time. They went 18-4-4 in their first 26 games and had winning streaks of five and four games in that time. Kaprizov had 17 goals, 42 points and was a plus-21 as he appeared in 25 of those games.