Nick Schultz News

The Toronto Maple Leafs will try to keep moving in the right direction as they will try for a third straight win when they host the Minnesota Wild tonight at Air Canada Centre.

Cal Clutterbuck and Mikko Koivu scored first-period goals and the Minnesota Wild held on to beat the Dallas Stars 3-2 on Saturday night.

Wild players didn't lose their razors. They're not trying to make a fashion statement.

Petr Sykora had a goal and an assist, and Eric Belanger and Antti Miettinen also scored to help the Minnesota Wild win for the first time in regulation this season, 3-2 over the New York Rangers on Friday night.

The Minnesota Wild downed the high-flying Pittsburgh Penguins 2-1 on Saturday to earn their first road win of the season.

Preview: The Wild, 0-8 on the road, visits the Igloo for the last time. The Wild is 6-2-1 all-time vs.

As he pondered who should become the Wild's first permanent captain, coach Todd Richards expected Mikko Koivu to make a strong case for himself.

Mikko Koivu congratulates Martin Havlat on his second period goal against the Philadelphia Flyers at the Wachovia Center on September 29, 2009 in Philadelphia.

The Wild are on the road again, and though this quick trip to St. Louis is lower-maintenance than their five-game, 11-day West Coast journey earlier this month, the results could be similarly disastrous if they do not break some terrible habits.

Officially, the NHL preseason ended a couple of weeks ago, but with Todd Richards keeping virtually all starters out of the lineup the Minnesota Wild did their finest impression of sports fans everywhere -- paying a regular season price for preseason games.

Minnesota Wild president and general manager Doug Risebrough says you have to be a realist in this new My NHL.

Upon review during the first intermission, the official scorer has awarded Minnesota's first-period goal to Mikko Koivu.

No, no, no -- the Wild didn't win a game. But the road trip from you know where did mercifully come to an end Saturday night.

COL MIN 3:44 0 1 COL MIN 4:25 1 1 18:07 2 1 COL MIN 15:09 2 2 OT COL MIN 2 2 Shootout Summary Start of Shootout period Shootout GOAL scored by Mikko Koivu on Craig Anderson Shootout attempt by Marek Svatos MISSES wide of net Shootout attempt by Martin Havlat MISSES wide of net Shootout attempt by Milan Hejduk SAVED by Niklas Backstrom Shootout ...

During Minnesota's surprise run to the 2003 Western Conference final, then-Vancouver general manager Brian Burke made the observation: "The Minnesota Wild isn't a hockey team; it's a cult." Six years later, Burke's assessment is being proven true.

Here's where things went south on the Wild's just-completed five-game road trip that dropped the team to 1-6 on the young season: FIVE-ON-FIVE When it comes to the NHL's 5-on-5 for-and-against ratio, no team is more abysmal than the Wild.

Posted on October 15th, 2009 12:46 AM By Michael Russo One more loss. One more injury.

No excuses, Wild coach Todd Richards says. It's time to start winning games. In his first season of directing the Wild, Richards might not know or care that this year's group is zeroing in on the worst start in franchise history.

Benoit Pouliot came to Wild training camp with a full beard and a wry smile. He's older and - more importantly, he says - wiser.

Greetings, sports fans! Warpy is trying hard not to turn this into the Official Kim "The Swedish Turnstile" Johnsson Haters blog, but it's getting harder and harder to do with every passing goal against.