Opening night rosters were to be submitted to the NHL by Monday at 5:00 p.m. eastern time. Meaning, Monday's practice for the Wild was an indication to what their opening night roster will be.
Wild head coach John Hynes said Monday that the team will not call anyone up or send anyone down before Thursday's home opener. Unless someone gets hurt between then, today's group was it.
Based on line rushes, Declan Chisholm looks to be the odd one out. He was rotating in with Jake Middleton on the Wild's second pair which left Jon Merrill taking every rush with Zach Bogosian.
Chisholm, 24, played great in the team's first preseason game but the few towards the end of camp he wasn't very impressive and turned the puck over on a few different occasions.
He ran the Wild's second power play unit all of last year, once he came over after the Wild claimed him off waivers. But with Jared Spurgeon healthy and ready to go, the Wild have their two defensemen for their two power play units.
“It does affect him, yeah," Hynes said of if Spurgeon being back affects Chisholm. "Because right now you have Faber running the top unit, and I think Spurgeon has played well and has done a nice job (on the power play). You look and even the goal that (Marco) Rossi scored, he did a great job. Then you’ve gotta look at the penalty kill side of things, want to look at 5-on-5 play. I think some of those things will play themselves out, but I wouldn’t say that everything is automatic, either.”
A few days ago in camp the Wild worked on power play stuff with both Spurgeon and Chisholm on the second power play unit. But now with Matt Boldy back, the Wild have moved Ryan Hartman off the top unit and placed him on the second.
The second unit included Marcus Johansson, Marco Rossi, Freddy Gaudreau, Spurgeon, and Chisholm. The Wild could either put Hartman in Gaudreau's spot or elect to take Chisholm out of the lineup.
“I think there’s some things we want to talk to a couple guys about and then make the decision based on what we’ve seen in camp," Hynes said. "I don’t think it’s a situation, as I’ve said before with everything, that guys are just in spots to get them. I think there are some guys that played really well. We have a few more days until the game, and then we’ll kind of solidify the lineup.”
It is starting to look like Chisholm could be the odd man out when it comes to who will be the team's seventh defenseman. But, Hynes did say just because someone starts as a scratch doesn't mean they will be for game two or game three.
“I think you have to let some games play out here, see how players play and go from there," Hynes said. "There is a huge, understandably, build-up to (who makes) the opening day roster, but that opening day roster could change (on) Day 2. And with the goalies, to answer your question directly, let’s see how the games play out. We’ll pick the starter, see how he plays. We have a back-to-back, we have a four (games) in six (days) coming up here. We’ll see how they play and how other guys play.
“I think over the course of 4-5 games, you’re always putting in the lineup who you think is going to give you the best chance to win, and saying that, we think we’ve had a lot of guys that deserve to play. Some of it will be performance-based when the regular season starts, and then we’ll just have to make decisions from there.”
