Wild Warmup: Minnesota at St. Louis

The essentials

ST. LOUIS -- After another brief respite in the schedule, the Wild will resume its franchise-record seven-game road swing on Saturday when it faces the St. Louis Blues at Enterprise Center.
Minnesota began its stretch away from home by splitting back-to-back games in Vancouver and Edmonton on Monday and Tuesday before traveling home for two days off. The Wild practiced in St. Paul on Friday before flying to Missouri, where it will play its division rivals for the first time this season. But it won't be long before the clubs meet here again; Minnesota and St. Louis will play again eight days after Saturday's meeting when the Wild closes it's road trip here on Nov. 11.

The Blues enter play Saturday in last place in the Central Division, trailing first-place Nashville by nine points in the standings and the Wild by five points. St. Louis has been trending in the right direction, however, winning its past two games and posting a 3-1-1 record in its past five.
"They're starting to play like they're capable of," said Wild coach Bruce Boudreau. "They're probably feeling pretty good, so it's going to be a good test for us in that building."
St. Louis was one of the winners of the offseason, bringing in reinforcements down in the middle by trading for Ryan O'Reilly from Buffalo and signing Tyler Bozak away from Toronto.

O'Reilly leads the Blues in scoring with 12 assists and 15 points in 11 games while Bozak has gotten off to a slow start with three goals and six points. Vladimir Tarasenko has six goals to lead St. Louis in that category.
Goaltender Jake Allen has earned the start between the posts 10 times this season, posting a 4-2-3 record with a 3.88 goals-against average and an .878 save percentage.

Sute up

• Ryan Suter tallied two assists on Tuesday for his 69th career multi-assist game. He has three points (1-2=3) in the last two games, eight points (2-6=8) in the last seven games and 12 points (3-9=12) in 12 contests this season. He ranks leads the Wild in assists and T-1st in points. He ranks T-2nd amongst NHL defensemen in TOI/gm (26:01) and T-6th in goals, assists and points while being the only NHL defenseman with a SHG, GWG and a PPG this season.
• The blueliner's PPG marked his 200th career power-play point. He becomes the seventh active NHL defenseman to reach the milestone, 52nd all-time. He tallied a power-play assist on Oct. 13 vs. Carolina to register his 100th career PPP with the Wild. He is the first Wild defenseman to reach the milestone, fifth all-time.

Grand Finnish

• Mikael Granlund extended his point streak to nine games, tallying two points (1-1=2) Tuesday night. He has tallied 12 points (6-6=12) during the streak, the longest point streak by a Wild player this season.
• His point streak is T-2nd longest amongst active NHL point steaks and is three games shy from tying his franchise-best 12-game point streak (1/12-2/4/17). He leads the team in goals, T-1st in GWG (2) and scoring, T-3rd in assists and fifth in shots (26). His two GWG also rank T-5th in the NHL.

Special special teams

• Minnesota netted three power-play goals Tuesday to stretch its PPG streak to three games. The Wild is 5-for-13 on the power-play since Oct. 27, leading the NHL in PPG and PP% (38.5).
• The three PPG scored in Edmonton (10/30) are tied for the fourth-most scored in a single road game in franchise history and the most in a road game since Dec. 10, 2011 at ARI (3).
• The Wild also killed all five of the Oilers power-play opportunities Tuesday and has killed 25 of its opponent's 27 power-play opportunities in the last six games.
• Minnesota ranks third in the NHL with a 92.6% penalty kill since Oct. 19 and is sixth in the League overall with an 86.8% on the PK (46-for-53) this season.
• The Wild also ranks T-4th in the NHL with three shorthanded goals. Two of its three SHG are owned by defensemen - Jonas Brodin and Ryan Suter. Both are two of only five NHL blueliners with a SHG this season (Trevor Daley, Brenden Dillon & P.K. Subban).

Series notes

2017-18: Minnesota went 3-1-0 in four season meetings against St. Louis…The Wild fell 6-3 at Scottrade Center (11/25), earned a 2-1 overtime win at Xcel Energy Center (12/2), took a 6-2 victory in St. Louis (2/6) and won 8-3 in Saint Paul (2/27)…LW Jason Zucker led the team with nine points (2-7=9)…C Eric Staal recorded eight points (5-3=8)…RW Mikael Granlund tallied six points (2-4=6)…D Ryan Suter had five points (1-4=5)…G Devan Dubnyk went 3-1-0 with a 2.99 GAA and a .917 SV% in four games…LW Jaden Schwartz (3-2=5), LW Alexander Steen (0-5=5) and RW Vladimir Tarasenko (2-3=5) led the Blues with five points each…D Colton Parayko tallied four assists…G Jake Allen went 1-0-1 with a 3.66 GAA and a .843 SV% in four games (three starts)…G Carter Hutton went 0-2-0 with a 8.00 GAA and a .758 SV% in two games (one start).
WILD LEADERS: C Mikko Koivu leads the Wild with 36 points (12-24=36) in 50 games against St. Louis…Suter has 36 points (5-31=36) in 67 matches…Staal owns 20 points (11-9=20) in 23 contests…LW Zach Parise has 18 points (10-8=18) in 27 games…C Charlie Coyle owns 17 points (5-12=17) in 25 matches.
WILD GOALIES: Dubnyk is 9-13-2 with a 3.18 GAA and a .896 SV% in 24 career starts vs. the Blues…G Alex Stalock is 0-0-1 with a 4.21 GAA and a .800 SV% in three games.
BLUES LEADERS: Steen leads the Blues with 27 points (6-21=27) in 35 contests against Minnesota…LW David Perron owns 23 points (9-14=23) in 29 matches…Tarasenko has 20 points (10-10=20) in 22 games…Schwartz owns 19 points (10-9=19) in 22 contests…D Alex Pietrangelo owns 15 points (3-12=15) in 33 matches.
BLUES GOALIES: Allen is 7-3-1 with a 2.45 GAA and a .906 SV% in 15 games (12 starts) vs. the Wild…G Chad Johnson is 2-1-0 with a 2.68 GAA, a .905 SV% and one shutout in five career games (four starts).

Did you know?

The Wild has points in 14 of its last 21 contests against the Blues (10-7-4)…Minnesota is 5-7-4 in the last 16 games in St. Louis, including six extra session contests.
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