Following a 5-2 loss on Tuesday to the Colorado Avalanche, the Minnesota Wild have officially been eliminated from playoff contention for the 2023-24 NHL season. With now a 37-31-10 record, this is the first time since the 2019-20 season that the Wild did not qualify for the postseason. In that COVID-affected campaign, Minnesota went 35-16-5, and fell to the Vancouver Canucks in a best-of-five qualifying series. The last time they won a playoff series was in 2014-15, when the Wild defeated the St. Louis Blues in six games before later falling to the Chicago Blackhawks in the second round.
This season was Minnesota’s first under new head coach John Hynes, who had previously coached five seasons for the New Jersey Devils, and the last four with the Nashville Predators. Now almost finished with his tenth season as an NHL head coach, Hynes has compiled a career 171-127-18 record as of April 10. There are four games remaining in the regular season. His teams have never finished better than fourth place in their division.
As was the case last off-season, where Minnesota adopted a “run it back” strategy keeping the core of their team together without any major additions, it’s likely the team will do the same following this season. The only players that will be unrestricted free agents, with their current 2023-24 statistics, are: forward Jacob Lucchini (36 games, 5 points), defenseman Alex Goligoski (33 games, -9 +/-) and Dakota Mermis (47 games, -2 +/-), as well as 39-year-old goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury (38 games, .899 save percentage).
The Wild will not be losing any key players to free agency, and with most of the starting lineup missing time with injury this season, it’s possible Minnesota could be in better shape next year even without making any moves.
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