ST. PAUL, Minn. — Jesper Wallstedt’s now-viral celebration started after a shootout win for AHL Iowa last season.

Going back to it this season, Wallstedt said, “came out of nowhere.” First, he did it after an emotional shootout win over the Kings. Then again after his first shutout of the season.

“It’s just me trying to be himself and enjoy the time that is right now,” said Wallstedt, 23. “And I’m having a little fun doing it.”

It’s natural to wonder if some part of the celebration — dropping to one knee and sliding while shooting an imaginary arrow into the sky — is also a clap back at his critics after so many struggles last season. (It’s not, he said.)

But after Wallstedt’s red-hot start to this season — 6-0-2, with three shutouts — he’s making many of them eat crow.

“When you’re struggling, you read a lot of the stuff about yourself,” Wallstedt told The Athletic on the latest “Fellowship of the Rink” podcast. “You’re like, ‘Oh, it wasn’t my fault.’ This guy is thinking, ‘I’m s—. I’m a bust.’ Everything. ‘It’s not my fault. It’s everyone else’s fault.’ Then you go into that bad cycle. But when you’re succeeding now, you’re just laughing at all the comments you got throughout the way.

“You’re like, ‘You didn’t think I’d get here. All of you guys thought I was a bust already after one bad year in my whole career.’ In that way, it feels kind of good to prove just a little bit. Even though it’s a small sample size. There’s a lot of hockey left. But it feels good in the beginning now to kind of point the middle finger back a little bit and try to get on a roll.”

Herakles the Archer cast, by Émile-Antoine Bourdelle, 1909, 📸 by @schmidtyphoto pic.twitter.com/TQk0M3StBb

— ArtButMakeItSports (@ArtButSports) November 20, 2025

Wallstedt’s roll has been remarkable. He’s won five straight, and his three shutouts lead the league. He entered the season expected to be backup to No. 1 Filip Gustavsson, but now they’re in a deserved rotation. And this just months after the low point in the first-round pick’s career.

“All I kind of needed was a fresh start,” Wallstedt said. “Delete last year. Don’t think too much about it. My game plan, I’ve always felt like it is some of my strengths. I know I play a solid game, and I like the way I play goalie. Then there’s small tweaks you can adjust and get better at. But for me, it was mostly get away from it, get a reset and then build that excitement to get back for a new season and start it off in a better way.”

Wallstedt went back home to Sweden last offseason and didn’t watch hockey until Game 5 of the Stanley Cup Final. He didn’t even want to think about the game he grew up loving. He vacationed in Spain for a week with his girlfriend, Erika. Then he started the process of figuring out what went wrong.

He went through his notebook. Wild coach Frederic Chabot had given him a small notebook a year or so ago, telling him to record thoughts after starts. Each page held five or six sentences. The messages were short and certainly not sweet. They were stinging, especially months later.

“I was not in a good headspace,” Wallstedt said. “Obviously, you learn, looking back toward that. Because when you’re in that moment, it’s like you look for a bright spot at the end of the tunnel, but for me there was no bright spots. It was just a dark tunnel. That was the feeling that I had throughout last year.

“You get another perspective when you’re in the summer, like, ‘OK, maybe it wasn’t that bad.’ You re-create those feelings and you go through them and process them.”

Wallstedt entered training camp in a much better place — and in great shape. The Wild noticed a difference in his practice habits. As Chabot put it, Wallstedt was “on” for every minute, every shot. And that’s translated into games.

Wallstedt admits that his work ethic in practice wasn’t a strong point previously.

“When I came over from the SHL, I was always very talented,” Wallstedt said. “I was very far ahead, and I didn’t care much about practice. I thought as long as I competed when it matters. I always loved competing when you play for something. It had to be almost a prize or reward, really, to get into it, when I was a little younger.

“I got to the AHL and there were so many games, and I kind of thought as long as I played good, practice is so-so.”

Wallstedt said his habits started to improve in his second year in Iowa, pushed by goalie coach Richard Bachman. No matter how he hard he worked, though — and sometimes maybe he pushed too hard — it didn’t matter. “My head was just not there,” he said.

“Now you get to the NHL it was a little more fun in practice,” Wallstedt said. “You make a glove save on Kirill (Kaprizov) shot, you’re going to be happy. You’re laughing. ‘Oh Kirill, I got it. I got it right here.’ You get one, two, three, four rebounds from (Joel Eriksson Ek), he’s almost pushing you into the net, and you still save it. I give him s—. ‘Not this time.’ Then he comes in and scores on the next one.

“The internal competition within our team is something that makes us all better. We push each other.”

What’s springboarded the Wild in this recent 9-1-1 stretch is how Wallstedt and Gustavsson have pushed each other. Gustavsson said the other day after his shutout that they have a healthy competition — that he knows if he doesn’t play well, Wallstedt is going to take the net more.

“We’re also the biggest supporters to each other,” Wallstedt said. “In practice, both guys want to make every save. As soon as we’re playing a game, we’re on the same team. We both want to play. We both want to win. But we want our team to succeed. We have a really good balance. If both goalies are hot, our team is going to have a really good chance at winning.”

The two bonded in camp this year. Wallstedt arrived in early August and couldn’t wait to make tee times for them to get together. They have different personalities and styles in net but common interests. It’s not just both being from Sweden, or training in Lulea with the same goalie coach for a bit. They enjoy golf and video games. They’re among the group on Wild who play Call of Duty and Counter Strike together (Marcus Johansson, Mats Zuccarello, Jonas Brodin, Kaprizov are some of the others).

“We’re having a lot of fun together,” Wallstedt said.

That’s the Marc-Andre Fleury influence. The now-retired future Hall of Famer played a big role in Gustavsson’s development into a No. 1. They pushed each other but were each other’s biggest fans. They sometimes shared rides from the rink. Fleury even helped Gustavsson in his off-the-wall midgame mental gymnastics, like naming an animal for every letter in the alphabet. Fleury also had an impact on Wallstedt in their short time together. There are three framed jerseys on the wall of Wallstedt’s home in Sweden: one from his draft, one from his NHL debut and a signed Fleury Wild sweater. He approached Fleury in one of his first callups when the veteran had said it’d be his last season.

What’d he learn from Fleury?

“It’s supposed to be a lot of fun,” Wallstedt said. “I like seeing him in practice every day. He’d throw his stick trying to make saves. He never gave up on plays. And even though he let in goals, he’d be laughing either way. He was showing up after games he lost, always happy, ready to go. He always reminded everyone that it’s a privilege to play in the NHL and doing your hobby as work.

“That’s the one thing that stands out. It seems like he’s always having a good day. It’s a great day to play hockey.”

Wallstedt’s approach during the game is much different than Gusatvsson’s — “I just want complete silence in my head,” he said — but he has enjoyed collaborating with his partner on his ritual. For now, they’re trying to name every champion — in alphabetical order — from one of their favorite video games, League of Legends. They’re up to “Q.”

“He’s always coming up with pretty fun stuff,” Wallstedt said. “I’m maybe more simple.”

Gustavsson said the dynamic is different from what it was with Fleury. “Fleury was more chill,” he said. “It was his last wave, a little bit. He knew he was going to retire. He loved all the games he got and played those. Now it’s more about just competing every game who is playing the next one.”

Gustavsson could be making the start on Wednesday in Chicago, which would be the fourth straight time a Wild goaltender who picked up a shutout didn’t start the next game. But Gustavsson’s playing well too, and that’s a good problem to have. Gustavsson said before the season their goal was to become a top-five duo in the league.

“That’s what we’re pushing for,” Gustavsson said. “It doesn’t matter who the coach puts in; it’ll be a good goalie who plays.”

Wallstedt is not taking for granted any start or win, especially considering what happened last year. He’s been the first to say the team in front of him is the main reason for his success in the first few months of the season. But Wallstedt laughed as he said he still remembers some of the people on social media who had some, well, pretty mean tweets.

“I definitely know a couple on Twitter that are not my favorite supporters,” Wallstedt said, smiing. “And it’s kind of fun looking back now. Now, apparently out of nowhere, they’re loving me. It’s kind of funny how the tide changes pretty quickly.”

https://t.co/o6hVE1I9E9 pic.twitter.com/E1ctxQxfyG

— Minnesota Wild (@mnwild) November 20, 2025