There will be a lot on the line when the Minnesota Wild resume their NHL schedule on Thursday night. The Wild are visiting the Colorado Avalanche in their first game after the Olympic break. They’re hanging onto the second spot in the Central Division and looking to hold off the Dallas Stars for any advantage in a potential first-round playoff matchup.
The stakes trickle down to the players on the roster. Quinn Hughes could secure a massive bag if he leads the Wild to a deep playoff run. Kirill Kaprizov is looking to erase any doubt the Wild paid him too much last fall. Matt Boldy is chasing 50 goals, Filip Gustavsson and Jesper Wallstedt are looking to hammer the “Two Good Goalies” slogan home, and most importantly, the Wild will be looking to get out of the first round of the playoffs for the first time in a decade.
That’s a lot to keep an eye on for any hockey fan. But it all pales in comparison to what John Hynes has on the line.
Hynes likely isn’t going anywhere if the Wild come up short this postseason. In just over two seasons at the helm, Hynes (113 wins) is closing in on his win totals from previous stints with the New Jersey Devils (150 wins over five years) and Nashville Predators (134). His .611 points percentage with the Wild is higher than his previous two stops and is second in franchise history to Dean Evason, his predecessor.
There’s also some comfort knowing that he’s Bill Guerin’s second head coach during his tenure as general manager. Since most GMs don’t get the chance to hire three coaches, if Hynes is fired, it could be part of a full housecleaning in St. Paul. But that’s not the reason why Hynes has a lot on the line.
Ultimately, it comes down to what Hynes has done in the postseason. In five previous trips to the playoffs, Hynes hasn’t gotten out of the first round once. He has never been able to drag a series past six games. Another series was a four-game loss to the Arizona Coyotes during the NHL’s bubble in Edmonton during the COVID-19 pandemic.
It’s not that Hynes has been a bridesmaid during the playoffs. It’s that he hasn’t even been in the wedding party, and Wild fans already experienced this during last year’s playoffs.
There were times when the Wild looked like a team capable of a deep run in their first-round series against the Vegas Golden Knights. Kaprizov and Boldy combined for 10 goals. Marcus Foligno was a wrecking ball, using his physicality to fluster his opponent. Grand Casino Arena was a crucible of noise when the Wild took a 2-1 lead, and everything was heading in the right direction.
But then Hynes’s flaws came to light. While Kaprizov and Boldy carried the offense, Foligno was the only player with three or more goals in the series. Points were even harder to come by, even with Ryan Hartman’s six, and the Golden Knights dusted themselves off to win the final three games and send the Wild to their annual April tee times.
But it was more than just production. Hynes’s teams are known for spurts of high-intensity play followed by mind-numbing lethargy. The 2025-26 season has been a microcosm of this, with the Wild stumbling out of the gate with a 3-6-3 record during October.
“I think it comes down to consistency in our game,” Hynes told The Athletic’s Michael Russo when asked if his team was “fragile” after the slow start. “Like, why did we get outskated? Why did we win a lot of faceoffs in the first period, and then we didn’t win any faceoffs in the second half?
“It’s not about being fragile, it’s about doing the right things. It’s about having some toughness to you and digging in. Understanding when we’re in those situations that they matter. It’s not about being fragile; it’s about digging in and competing. If there’s a 50-50 puck, you want the puck, or you don’t want the puck? You’ve got to outcompete them.”
Hynes’s criticism from last October could be copied and pasted to describe many of the Wild’s playoff series since they last got out of the first round. To his credit, Hynes was able to help the Wild get out of their early-season tailspin to have their playoff spot virtually locked up with a 99.98% chance to make the playoffs according to MoneyPuck’s playoff odds.
But none of it matters unless Hynes leads this team to a deep playoff run.
Hynes has the talent he needs to get deep into the postseason, and another move for a top-line center at the trade deadline could amplify that. Even then, adding a bottom-six scoring winger should allow the Wild to throw haymakers against the Avalanche or Stars and could get the monkey off Hynes’s back that he can’t defeat elite teams in a playoff series.
No coaching job in the NHL is guaranteed long-term. But if Hynes can get the job done, he could stick around in Minnesota for the foreseeable future.
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