ST. PAUL — Despite mounting adversity, the Minnesota Wild could use a fast start.
The Wild have a road-heavy schedule to start the 2026-27 NHL season. 20 of their first 30 games are on the road, including five of the first seven, and they’ll be forced to do so without two very important pieces to the team.
They’ll go at least the first month without goaltender Filip Gustavsson, who’s expected back in November from offseason hip surgery. Wild GM Bill Guerin also announced this week that Brock Faber is out for an unknown period of time after a flying hockey puck fractured his skull and required surgery last weekend and is sidelining the 24-year-old indefinitely.
In net, Calvin Pickard will fill in for Gustavsson and backup Jesper Wallstedt, who solidified himself as a 1A-goaltender last season. Covering Faber on the top blueline opposite Quinn Hughes will be team captain Jared Spurgeon. His right shot, skating ability, and high IQ make him the obvious choice. But the blueline shuffle affects each pairing from top to the bottom. Jonas Brodin will remain on the second pairing, but the only remaining right-handed defenseman to match with him would be Zach Bogosian or rookie David Špaček. Olli Mättää is a capable veteran. Carson Lambos and Daemon Hunt are both young, left-handed, and may all be taking on larger roles than they initially thought heading into training camp. It could take a few lineup changes to get it dialed in.
What is clear as the season begins: this team will be tested in many ways over the next few months. It will be up to them whether they sink or swim and push through the adversity already hitting right out of the gate.
There’s also some glaring unfinished business with the team’s top player.
Wild leadership already extended Guerin and John Hynes in recent weeks, but the big question mark is when Quinn Hughes will finally sign – if that’s even his intention. Hughes, often argued as the No. 2 or 3 defenseman in the league, can essentially name his price. But he’s been eligible since July 1, and he’s been in Minnesota for the past two weeks. Could he be waiting to see how the team starts to decide if, and for how long he intends to stay? That raises the stakes for how they come out of this upcoming two-month gauntlet. Without an extension, there’s currently nothing to prevent him from walking away Summer 2027 in the case that Guerin chose to hold him in hopes of a deep playoff run.
The Wild could allow early-season adversity to galvanize this year’s team, which should be hungry for a Stanley Cup run after the success they had in the second half following Hughes arrival until the end. 20 games on the road in the first 61 days of the season could also do a lot to strengthen and build its confidence. After advancing beyond the first round last spring for the first time in over a decade, the expectation now is maintaining a standard that gets them beyond the first round on a yearly basis. Not only should they do what is necessary to maintain that standard, they need to try to elevate it.
A strong run showing these first two months without Faber or Gustavsson, and whatever else may be yet to come, could set them in line to meet that standard over the final four or five months of the regular season and into the playoffs.
And why not? They have the core to do it. Hughes, Kirill Kaprizov and Matt Boldy are in an elite class of NHL talent. Faber and Wallstedt are as well and will be vital to another playoff run. Joel Eriksson Ek, Jonas Brodin, Jared Spurgeon – they still have a lot to offer a playoff-caliber team, but must stay healthy to make the difference. Michael McCarron, Marcus Foligno and Nick Foligno could make a bruising fourth line, and Bobby Brink, Danila Yurov, along with newcomer Maxim Shabanov could reach another level of play under the right conditions this season. Let’s also be excited about the potential new center Charlie Stramel can bring to a team desperate for another quality center. The conditions for this team to be even better than last year quite possibly exist, but that means expectations this season are very high, no matter what the first 30, or the final 20 games look like. They won’t be the only team facing adversity throughout the hockey season, but they can learn something about themselves that helps gain the edge that was missing in the second round against Colorado last spring. They need to find out early if they have the championship DNA it takes to return to their first Western Conference Final since 2003.
If they can get into December with a winning record or hovering around .500, they’ll play 9-of-13 games at Grand Casino Arena to close out December and give them a shot to head into 2027 with some confidence.