The Thing About Gustav Nyquist

Here is the thing about Gustav Nyquist:
He just looks like he belongs here. Looks like he was meant to be in the corridors of Xcel Energy Center, on the ice in a Wild jersey, in the Wild locker room.
Gus Nyquist looks like he's been here, well, forever.

He doesn't look at all like a guy who suffered a shoulder injury that looked like it was going to cost him the regular season and playoffs. Or a guy who, surprisingly, got traded at the deadline even though there were no guarantees he'd play again and had to leave his wife and two young daughters at home in Columbus to start over again with a new team.
Joe Cool has nothing on Gus Nyquist. On second thought maybe it's not cool but comfort. Like the comfortable way he has seamlessly become a critical part of the Wild team, recording at least a point in the first six games in which he played including the first three games of this opening round series against Dallas.
Like the comfort that comes from being in the right place both on the ice and in your head.
"Obviously it's nice to be able to contribute," Nyquist said. "That's what I'm trying to do here for this team. But whatever it is, I'm just going to try to play my game and help the team out in any way I can."
Rarely a day passes that someone doesn't ask Head Coach Dean Evason about Nyquist and his impact on the team. There's always a variation on a theme when Evason responds to these queries.
"He's been a pro. He's been in this league for a long time right and just because he hasn't been playing in the NHL here for this year for a while doesn't mean you forget how to play," Evason said.
The respect for Nyquist from Evason goes all the way back to the minor pros.
"No, I remember him in Grand Rapids and I hated him when he was there and he was just so good," Evason said. "He's very versatile, too. We've spoken to him about playing right or left and he's got no issues playing either one. He's a very mature guy and very calm guy on the ice and has the skill set obviously he is real good as far as offensively but defensively he is a real sound pro and again big asset for us."
Nyquist had previously lost an entire season (2020-21) to a torn labrum in his shoulder. Luckily the shoulder injury he suffered on Jan. 25 in Edmonton did not require surgery. But as a veteran player on an expiring contract, Nyquist knew the injury would blunt opportunities to be moved to a contender. Barring a trade a long period of uncertainty loomed for Nyquist heading into the off-season.
"Yeah, obviously every scenario went through my head," Nyquist said. "But you know I figured my chances of playing playoff hockey would obviously get smaller when I was hurt. The timeline put me right in it and I didn't know, I'm sure that put a lot of teams off maybe. But you know I'm happy that Billy (Wild GM Bill Guerin) took a chance on me here for me to heal up and I'm happy to be back and sitting here today."
To go from the unknown to the Stanley Cup playoffs? No wonder Nyquist has a perpetual grin on his face.
"This is why we play the game obviously," he said. "To be able to play with this team here we're such a good team and to be able to go in the playoffs feeling good here it's a nice feeling."
In typical Nyquist fashion he did not just simply wait out his recovery. He was proactive. He flew to Minnesota shortly after the trade and joined the team on the road.
"I only missed one or two short ones (trips) even though I wasn't skating with the team or anything," Nyquist said. "Just to get to know everyone, getting comfortable with the team, your teammates, the system, watching up close. I think system-wise, too, that kind of probably put me in a better spot than not obviously not being there. Even though you're not on the ice you get to see it up close."
The plan has yielded immediate dividends with Nyquist fitting in seamlessly not that Guerin is all that surprised.
"He's a very good player. He's not a middle of the road player. He's very good, he has been for a long time," Guerin said. "I guess I shouldn't be surprised but I'm just happy. I'm happy about it. He's been great. I think this guy would fit into any locker room. He's just a good guy."
Nyquist had been on the Wild's radar for some time. Playing in the final year of his current contract, and with Columbus in rebuild mode, it seemed logical to assume he would be available at some point.
"Then he got hurt which was a real bummer," Guerin said.
The Wild GM kept in touch with his counterpart in Columbus, Jarmo Kekalainen, and felt confident at the deadline that there was a good chance Nyquist's shoulder, which did not require surgery, would have him ready late in the regular season or early in the playoffs. The Wild sent a 5th round pick to Columbus for the winger. Right now it looks like a monumental steal.
Per Bjurman is the dean of Swedish hockey writers and one of Sweden's most accomplished journalists writing for the popular daily newspaper Aftonbladet. He's known Nyquist since Nyquist broke into the NHL with the Detroit Red Wings a decade ago. At the time the Red Wings still had a formidable collection of Swedish players including Hall of Famer Nicklas Lidstrom, Niklas Kronwall, Tomas Holmstrom, Henrik Zetterberg and so on.
In fact it was Kronwall and Zetterberg who introduced Bjurman to Nyquist.
"We hit it right off," Bjurman said. "He is fun and friendly and smart."
Because Nyquist played in North America at the University of Maine, he is probably not as well known in his home country as his skill set might suggest. "Smart kid," Bjurman said.
Zetterberg used to tease Nyquist about being from the Swedish upper class and helped bestow his longstanding nickname "Hastpolo-Gustav" which translates to Polo-Gustav. If your Swedish is good, you'll notice that is how Nyquist is referred to in Bjurman's popular hockey blog.
In fact Nyquist has sometimes jokingly accused Zetterberg and Bjurman of writing the blog together.
"Zetterberg even ordered and wore a Polo outfit, with the name Nyquist on the back, for a masquerade ball they had in Detroit. Gus was not very happy," Bjurman recalled.
The Swedes enjoyed a healthy sense of fun and Nyquist, although younger, tried to keep up in the pranks with his countrymen.
"And had to pay dearly for it every time. He never learned," Bjurman said. "One time Kronwall had the rims of the wheels of his (Nyquist's) fancy car changed while they were skating. So Gus had to drive home with flamboyant green rims after the practice. In Detroit."
Is Bjurman surprised at the immediate impact Nyquist has had in such a short period of time with the Wild? "Not really, no. He was always this smart, quick, energetic player," the veteran writer said. "But it was hard to have the same impact with a not so good Blue Jackets team the last couple of seasons, I'd say. Now when he's with such a good team - where they seem to have so much fun and really care for each other - it's not that surprising."
It's hard to measure the impact of a young man coming into a room like the Red Wing room but suffice it to say it was significant.
"It was an intimidating locker room to step into in your first game," Nyquist recalled of his early days with the still dynamic Red Wing organization.
"But from the start they've always been so great to me and especially I think Kronwall. I stayed with him every time I got called up. He made sure I stayed at his place instead of staying at a hotel. That meant a lot to me," Nyquist said. "Him and Henrik Zetterberg probably meant the most to my career I think and just learning from them first-hand and being around them every day and see how hard they worked."
"One thing I think that stuck out to me was how they bring it every day, every day they want it, they've done it all and they never seemed to have a bad game," Nyquist added. "That was impressive to me and it was great for me to be around."
Longtime NHLer and top analyst Jody Shelley saw Nyquist up close during the three seasons Nyquist was a Blue Jacket. Given the expectation that Nyquist was going to be traded, Shelley said people were so disappointed for Nyquist when he got hurt and then so happy for him when he did end up in Minnesota. There's also a hope that he will return as a free agent in the summer.
"That's the type of player he is. I love everything about him," Shelley said. "You can't replace him."
"He's just a really, really, really thoughtful teammate from what I can see," Shelley added. "He just understands. He sees all as a leader. And I really enjoy that about him."
On the ice it's not just the skill set but knowing how to use it. "It's how he makes the little plays that teammates and coaches appreciate far before they show up on the highlight reels," Shelley said.
Even Nyquist's path to pro hockey is a little different, dare we say cool, as it relates to the path most Swedes take.
In studying business and finance at the University of Maine while playing for the Black Bears, Nyquist was one of a small number of European players choosing this path.
"In Sweden there's no school hockey so you either go to university (to study) or you play pro," Nyquist said. After not being drafted by an NHL club in his first year of eligibility Nyquist needed to make sure he had a backup plan.
"You're only an injury away or it's hard to make it (in the NHL) right? For me, my background with my parents have always pushed me academically and just have something to fall back if it doesn't work out," he said of going the Division I route.
"I think that was my thought process going over and also playing in a really good development league so you could kind of get the best of both worlds there. Felt like it was just a good decision for me and thinking back to, I had three of the best years of my life at school. It was an awesome experience. Sometimes I wish I could back," he said.
Nyquist joined the Black Bears at a time when the team was regrouping after a dominant run in Division I hockey. Head Coach Tim Whitehead had met Nyquist when Nyquist was actually visiting Boston College. Nyquist ended up choosing Maine and stayed three seasons leading the team in scoring each year and was a Hobey Baker finalist in his final two seasons.
"He made an impact early on, on a very, very young team," said Whitehead who is now coaching at Kimball Union Academy prep school in New Hampshire. "You could tell right away not only was he a dynamic hockey player but a really intelligent, great sense of humor, fun kid to be around. The guys on the team loved him."
He was one of those rare players that when he got the puck and headed up ice, "our whole bench would stand up, like, what's going to happen?" Whitehead said. "He was kind of a skating highlight reel."
In his second season Nyquist was in the group of three Hobey Baker finalists and Whitehead remembers fondly taking his own son Zach along with Nyquist's grandfather who'd made the trip from Malmo to the event in Detroit.
How Nyquist treated his son, then nine and now a freshman hockey player at Middlebury College, remains a special memory for Whitehead.
"Gus was a great role model for him," Whitehead said.
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As much as getting a chance to play in the playoffs has been an unexpected boon, it hasn't come without its strife for Nyquist and his family.
Nyquist and his wife have two girls aged two and four. And with the oldest in pre-kindergarten, they decided that Nyquist would come to Minnesota on his own. Before they came for a recent visit that included weekend games against Dallas, Nyquist hadn't seen his family in a month.
Do they understand why dad isn't around all the time?
"I think my oldest does a little bit. My youngest doesn't, she's two," Nyquist said. "But it's been a little harder for my older one. It's the world we live in, it's part of the life that we live and this is what we signed up for. So it's hard but it is what it is."