What is one to make of the 2025-26 Minnesota Wild? They certainly are one of the most talented teams the franchise has iced since joining the NHL as an expansion franchise in 2000 and — let’s face it — probably the most talented.
The Wild have two 40-goal scorers in Matt Boldy and Kirill Kaprizov, top shelf blue liners Brock Faber and Quinn Hughes and rock solid goaltending from Filip Gustavsson and Jesper Wallstedt. They have a superlative playmaker in Mats Zuccarello. are deep in veteran size and experience, and have a coach in John Hynes who has constructed a system to exploit it all.
One has to be real about this team’s chances when the postseason begins next week. The Wild are built for the Stanley Cup playoffs.
Sometimes you watch the Wild play and think, “Yeah, this team could make a run.” On Sunday, for instance, the Wild fell behind the Red Wings in Detroit early, then scored four straight goals against a team fighting, at home, for its playoff life. By the middle of the second period, it looked unfair — as if the Wild could have won 7-1.
Then you watch the Wild take their foot off the gas, and the Red Wings tie the game before Kaprizov caps a hat trick with the game-winner. Yeah, it speaks to the roster quality to have a guy like Kaprizov save two points with his third goal, but when the team loses at home to a series of also-rans in March, it can make one wonder if this team isn’t still the same one that lost its past eight first-round playoff series.
It’s impossible to say for sure until we get a few games into the first round of the playoffs, but we should get a good idea of this team’s mettle when the Wild play at Dallas on Thursday.
There has been a lot of talk about results not mattering as much now that the Wild have clinched their playoff berth and opponent, that now it’s about fine-tuning the team for the playoffs — testing lines, seeing which third- and fourth-liners will help the most, getting healthy. It matters.
But while there is merit to this argument, Thursday’s game is not a tune-up game. It’s a preview. These teams are locked into a first-round matchup and in simplest terms, the Wild have a chance to show Dallas — a Western Conference finalist the past three years — that they’re ready to take their spot in the hierarchy.
As important, a regulation win would tie the teams for second in the Central Division and set up a short regular-season race for home ice in the playoffs. Yes, the players and coaches will tell us, a team generally has to win at least one road game to advance. But stealing home ice from the team that has knocked Minnesota out of the postseason in 2016 and 2023 — with a combined 8-4 record — would send a message. So would finishing 3-1-0 against the Stars this season.
One of the reasons the Wild haven’t played in a second-round series since the days of Zach Parise-Ryan Suter Fever is that the best recent teams failed to use the season’s second half to improve playoff positioning (the Wild have won one division title in 25 years, and it was so long ago that the division was the Northwest).
Others had to fight to the end to secure a spot; last year’s team advanced because of Joel Eriksson Ek’s regulation goal in the closing seconds of the final regular-season game.
This year’s team has a chance to do it differently. The Wild have won five of their past six games with four more remaining. They have earned the chance — the chance — to finish second and earn home ice. That would be important. It would matter when the postseason starts, and it’s about more than home ice.
The Wild earned this chance and should treat it seriously. Win or lose on Thursday, we’ll learn a lot — not everything, but a lot — about this team’s postseason chances from the way it plays in Dallas.