Wild eye eighth straight win in matchup with Sabres
The Minnesota Wild will try for their eighth straight victory when they host the Buffalo Sabres on Saturday night.
The Wild are also 11-1-1 in their past 13 games, most recently beating the team with the best record in the NHL that was riding a 10-game winning streak.
Minnesota took down the visiting Colorado Avalanche 3-2 in a shootout on Friday, marking just the eighth time in NHL history that two teams met with winning streaks of at least six games, and the second time that happened with the Wild.
They were on a 12-game winning streak when the Columbus Blue Jackets beat them 4-2 on Dec. 31, 2016 to run their winning streak to 15 games.
"They're the best team in the league right now," Minnesota defenseman Jonas Brodin said of Colorado. "They [have] great players, but we're a good team, too, and I think we showed that."
The Wild will be up against a Buffalo team that's also playing its second game in two days. The Sabres were shut out 5-0 by the visiting New Jersey Devils on Friday and now head on the road, where they're 1-6-2 this season without a regulation victory.
The Wild would appear in good position to maintain their winning streak.
"I hope we keep doing it," Wild goalie Jesper Wallstedt said after making 39 saves against the Avalanche and stopping two of three attempts in the shootout.
Buffalo forward Tage Thompson said the Sabres played better against the Devils than the score indicated.
"I thought there was a lot of energy on the bench, and I thought our team was playing well," Thompson said. "I thought we controlled the first two periods pretty handily. Obviously, the score didn't indicate that, but I thought we had a lot of chances, a lot of opportunities."
The Wild placed Marcus Foligno on injured reserve on Friday with a lower-body injury and activated fellow forward Ryan Hartman, who had missed four games with a lower-body injury.
Foligno is week-to-week after leaving during the second period of a 4-3 overtime win at the Chicago Blackhawks on Wednesday. He has two assists in 23 games this season, while Hartman has four goals and four assists in 21 games.
Hartman assisted on the first of two goals by Kirill Kaprizov in his return to action on Friday.
Filip Gustavsson will start in goal for the Wild. Gustavsson is 2-1-1 in his career against the Sabres with a .938 save percentage and 1.75 goals against average
Pekka Luukkonen will start in goal for the Sabres after Alex Lyon made 18 saves against the Devils on Friday.
Luukkonen is 3-2-1 in his career against the Wild with a .922 save percentage and 2.44 goals-against average.
Sabres defenseman Mattias Samuelsson went to the locker room after taking an elbow to the face from Timo Meier in the third period. Buffalo coach Lindy Ruff did not have an update on Samuelsson immediately following the game.
Samuelsson is second on the team in ice time at 21:47 minutes a game.
‘I might’: Rangers coach may use Shesterkin vs. Lightning in back to back
Igor Shesterkin is a big reason why the New York Rangers are 3-0-0 this week. Coach Mike Sullivan isn’t saying whether he’ll get a shot at going 4-for-4 when the Tampa Bay Lightning come to Madison Square Garden on Saturday afternoon, 24 hours after No. 31 made 19 saves in a 6-2 road win against the Boston Bruins on Friday.
Sullivan tries to limit his No. 1 goaltender’s workload – and it paid off again Friday, when Shesterkin allowed two or fewer goals for the 12th time this season, tying him for the most such games in the NHL this season. He’s won six of his past eight starts and improved to 10-8-2. His 2.45 goals-against average and .911 save percentage are among the top 10 in the NHL in each category among goalies who’ve played at least 10 games.
Though Shesterkin started 20 of the Rangers’ 26 games this season, one thing he hasn’t done is play both ends of a back-to-back set. That could change Saturday, although Sullivan didn’t tip his hand after the win in Boston.
“Might I?” he replied when asked whether he planned to start Shesterkin in back-to-back games for the first time since March 15-16, 2025, and just the sixth time in his NHL career – twice after being pulled in the first game. “I might.”
But when asked “Will you?” his reply was simple: “I’ll tell you tomorrow.”
Sullivan’s decision on goalie use in back-to-backs this season usually consists of deciding which game Shesterkin gets and which goes to Jonathan Quick, one of the League’s top No. 2 goalies. But Quick appeared to injure his right leg in a crease collision late in the third period of a 3-2 loss to the Utah Mammoth on Saturday; the Rangers placed him on injured reserve Tuesday and brought up Dylan Garand from AHL Hartford to take his place.
The 23-year-old had an up-and-down preseason and a slow start to his fourth pro season in Hartford. He’s 3-6-2 as the No. 1 goalie for the mediocre Wolf Pack, with a 2.96 GAA and .897 save percentage. That’s a drop-off from last season, when Garand was an AHL All-Star, won 20 games for the first time as a pro, and tied for ninth among all goalies with a .913 save percentage.
Garand was a spectator during Shesterkin’s three wins this week, and yet to play in an NHL game. Facing the red-hot Lightning, who will also be playing the second of back-to-back games after a 6-3 road victory against the Detroit Red Wings that extended their winning streak to six games, might be too much to ask of an untested rookie.
Sullivan’s been cagey about who would start in the back-to-back games ever since Quick landed on IR.
“I’m not sure yet. We’re going to take each game as it comes. We’ll probably make decisions on a game-by-game basis,” Sullivan said Tuesday.
“What I will tell you is I think because we’ve managed ‘Shesty’s’ workload to this point fairly well, if anyone’s in a position to take on more of a workload, I think Shesty’s [in a position] to do that.”
