ST. LOUIS – Marc-Andre Fleury, sporting his black Wild baseball cap backward, had a front-row seat to historical past Tuesday night time, however he was the one who planted the seed in Filip Gustavsson’s head within the first place.
Then, as if Fleury diagramed the play for his goalie associate himself, the St. Louis Blues’ Pavel Buchnevich cooperated totally with a wonderfully positioned 79-foot shot instantly towards the Wild emblem on the middle of Gustavsson’s chest.
Gustavsson caught the puck along with his trapper for his twenty seventh save, dropped it in his blue crease, took purpose and sailed a magnificence the size of the ice for a bull’s-eye — the ultimate aim in a 4-1 Wild win.
It was the primary goalie aim in crew historical past and Gustavsson is the fifteenth goaltender in NHL common season historical past to attain a goalie aim.
“That was sudden,” goalie coach Freddy Chabot mentioned on the press elevator after the sport.
“That was superior,” basic supervisor Invoice Guerin mentioned. “You don’t see a goalie aim daily.”
“An influence-play aim,” identified assistant GM Michael Murray.
GOALIE GOAL! GOALIE GOAL! GOALIE GOAL! 🚨 pic.twitter.com/NS3CsKb9ge
— NHL (@NHL) October 16, 2024
With 34 seconds left within the Blues’ house opener and St. Louis making an attempt to kill a double minor, coach Drew Bannister known as timeout looking for a miracle along with his crew down two.
Fleury had different plans.
“I known as a fast goalie assembly,” Fleury mentioned, laughing.
Gustavsson skated over to the bench and bought some recommendation from the sensible future Corridor of Famer.
“Flower seemed as much as the board and was like, ‘We’re up two targets. You must most likely strive it should you get the possibility. You’re capturing, proper?’” Gustavsson recalled. “I used to be like, ‘Yeah, possibly I ought to.’”
Gustavsson had by no means scored a aim at any degree of hockey. He’d by no means take into account it with a one-goal lead as a result of if he missed, it could be an icing and an offensive-zone faceoff for the Blues.
“Up 2-nothing, I used to be like, ‘Yeah, if I get the possibility, I’ll strive it,’” Gustavsson mentioned.
After which he bought his probability.
Gustavsson figures Buchnevich was capturing the puck instantly at him so he’d catch it, freeze it and provides the Blues a late faceoff. However as an alternative, Buchnevich “simply put it straight within the glove and I attempted and put it down as fast as I may,” Gustavsson mentioned. “It simply laid good there on the ice, and I simply try to shoot it as onerous as I may.”
As Fleury mentioned, “Textbook.”
Celebrating the primary goalie aim in @mnwild historical past! 🤩 pic.twitter.com/X5ciE7FTea
— NHL (@NHL) October 16, 2024
Chabot, the Wild’s goalie coach of 5 seasons, likes to do enjoyable issues along with his goaltenders in apply.
One of many coolest trying is when he’ll have one goalie stand instantly in entrance of the opposite to set one ginormous display. Chabot will then whistle dead-accurate photographs to the left, then to the suitable, then again to the left … over and over and over on both facet of the screening goalie so the one within the crease has to battle to seek out the puck.
However probably the most enjoyable drill he conducts is goalie targets.
Former Wild goalie Kaapo Kahkonen was a goalie aim machine in his native Finland. Present Wild prospect Jesper Wallstedt, a fellow Swede like Gustavsson, has scored goalie targets, too, together with with Iowa within the AHL.
“I anticipated that from Wally,” Chabot mentioned. “Not Gus.”
What shocked Chabot probably the most was that he has by no means seen Gustavsson in any of their practices shoot the puck as excessive as he did.
“I often complain about my curve not being the suitable angle to get it that prime,” Gustavsson mentioned. “However I don’t know, additional powers or one thing.”
Most cool, based on ESPN, this was the third power-play aim by a goalie in NHL historical past (Evgeni Nabokov in 2002 and Martin Brodeur in 2013). He’s the second Swede to ever rating a goalie aim, based on NHL Stats (Linus Ullmark in 2023).
Hilariously, Guerin walked into the locker room to congratulate Gustavsson, then requested Fleury if he had ever scored one. Fleury knew full nicely his former Penguins teammate knew he had not, then cracked up and threw a towel on the Wild boss.
After he scored, Gustavsson was mobbed by his teammates on the ice — Brock Faber, Jonas Brodin, Marcus Foligno, Yakov Trenin and Marat Khusnutdinov.
Jakub Lauko’s first Wild aim is a shorthanded magnificence. 2-0 #mnwild pic.twitter.com/gLS19TpTcs
— Spoked Z (@SpokedZ) October 16, 2024
Jakub Lauko, who scored the game-winning short-handed aim within the second interval for his first aim with the Wild, wished to affix the pile from the bench. There have been solely 9 seconds left within the sport, however he figured it was in opposition to the foundations and determined to remain put.
Fortunately for him, Gustavsson skated to the bench and did a fist-bump flyby along with his blocker. The primary individual he greeted was a smiling, proud Fleury.
“Props to him,” Lauko mentioned. “It’s fairly spectacular, and he deserves it. It might have been nicer at house, with a full barn, however it’s an unimaginable second. I’m simply comfortable for him.”
Gustavsson’s aim was the Wild’s fourth power-play aim of the season. He joked that he wished to assist push the facility play over 20 %, however he truly pushed it to 30.8 %.
“Ought to most likely be within the energy play conferences now,” Gustavsson mentioned.
Wild coach John Hynes has seen a goalie aim earlier than. Whereas teaching Nashville, Pekka Rinne scored one in Chicago.
“It was certainly one of my first couple video games in Nashville,” he recalled. “Nevertheless it was nearly similar to Gus’s. It was form of a six-on-five state of affairs and form of dumped in on the goalie and he had time to have the ability to do it and you would inform each guys … had been going for it. Nice to see.”
With the Wild taking part in seven defensemen and never taking part in once more till in Columbus on Saturday, Kirill Kaprizov logged 27:59 of ice time — the second-most in his NHL profession. Based on ESPN, it was the sixth-most by a ahead who had no photographs in a sport since 2000-01.
However Kaprizov was terrific, having two lovely assists on targets by Ryan Hartman and Marco Rossi. He leads 2-0-2 Minnesota, which hasn’t trailed in any sport, with six factors.
Kaprizov has one aim, nevertheless, and volunteered that he’s tied in targets with the Wild’s No. 1 goalie: “Similar (variety of) targets like lots of guys.”
“It’s most likely not gonna be for lengthy,” Gustavsson mentioned.
The irony about Tuesday is earlier than the season, it’s believed the Wild had the Blues sport slated for Wallstedt’s season debut. However the Wild are inundated with accidents to Joel Eriksson Ek, Jared Spurgeon and Marcus Johansson, so Wallstedt needed to be despatched to Iowa to make room for callup Daemon Hunt. Plus, Gustavsson is taking part in so nicely, they want Wallstedt to get some practices and sport motion someplace and proper now it could possibly’t be Minnesota.
The Wild wish to get Wallstedt extra video games within the NHL this season than the three he bought final yr, however the secret is successful and if Gustavsson retains racking up victories, he ought to get the majority of the taking part in time.
If the Wild wish to get again into the playoffs this season, they want the “Gus Bus” to look and play just like the goalie of two years in the past who completed with the second-best save share and goals-against common within the NHL and never the one which floundered final season to a sub-.900 save share.
To date in three begins, he’s 2-0-1 with a 1.66 goals-against common and .948 save share. He labored onerous this offseason, got here again to Minnesota in tip-top form and has improved upon his apply habits.
“I don’t suppose I do something particular on the market,” he mentioned. “(I’m not) flashy. Clearly, I make some larger saves, however that’s often if you’re out of place. I simply attempt to be in the suitable place more often than not and make boring saves. And I feel that’s been working excellent to this point.”
Good, like within the second interval after Lauko’s short-handed aim the place he preserved a 2-0 lead by sprawling throughout his crease to rob Jordan Kyrou.
“Clearly everyone knows on the finish of final yr (Gustavsson) wasn’t comfortable and nobody was pleased with what had gone on,” Hynes mentioned. “He put some onerous work on this summer season and he’s come again in I feel the suitable mindset and realized his classes from final yr and now he’s are available in and he’s taking part in actual stable and also you want that.
“Early within the yr typically it’s powerful to win should you don’t get sturdy goaltending as a result of the video games are slightly bit scattered as everybody’s making an attempt to get used to the NHL tempo, there’s typically breakdowns, techniques aren’t completely dialed in the place they must be so when you will get actually high quality goaltending early, it provides you the perfect probability to win.”
Goalie targets assist, too.
Gus making Wild historical past 👏 pic.twitter.com/lnjSeLQikN
— Minnesota Wild (@mnwild) October 16, 2024
(Photograph: Dilip Vishwanat / Getty Photographs)