Alright, buckle up sports fans, because the Minnesota Wild just danced their way to a 6-4 victory over the Florida Panthers, but not without a bit of drama between the pipes. The Wild’s very own knight in padded armor, Marc-Andre “Flower” Fleury, got roughed up with an upper-body injury that sent him packing from the net faster than you can say “icing.” The injury came after the Wild potted their fourth power-play goal, and the Panthers said “au revoir” to their goalie Sergei Bobrovsky at the same time. Coincidence? I think not.
Cue the goalie musical chairs. In comes Filip Gustavsson for the Wild and Anthony Stolarz jumps in for the Panthers. It’s like a metaphor for life, folks: one minute you’re deflecting pucks, the next, you’re on the bench watching the game slurping Gatorade.
And let’s rewind to the beginning. Poor Fleury wasn’t just minding his own business when Panthers forward William Lockwood decided to introduce himself in the first period with a friendly crash. Talk about getting to know your opponents up close and personal.
After the game, Wild’s head honcho coach John Hynes played coy like a high school crush and didn’t spill much about Fleury’s status, only noting that he felt “OK” initially before he noped out of the crease. I guess we’ll all just have to wait with bated breath for that update.
Meanwhile, the Wild decided they needed some fresh goalie energy, summoning their wunderkind Jesper Wallstedt from the AHL. This twenty-one-year-old Swede had a bit of a traumatic welcome party in his NHL debut earlier on January 10, letting in seven goals against the Stars. Ouch. But hey, even the big names have those days—right, kid?
Before Fleury traded his mask for a towel, he managed to deflect ten of eleven shots that came his way. Gustavsson hopped in and got peppered with pucks, stopping twenty-five out of twenty-eight shots. Not too shabby under the circumstances.
Fleury, bless his veteran soul at thirty-nine, just skated past Patrick Roy for a solid second on the NHL’s all-time wins list on Monday, which is like being knighted in the hockey realm.
Oh, and not to be left out, Wild’s Connor Dewar had to ditch the game too with a lower-body mystery injury. Maybe something’s in the water over there in Minnesota?
And that, dear readers, wraps up this episode of “As the Goalie Turns.” Keep your heads up and sticks down until next time! Remember, all this play-by-play goodness is brought to you by the fine folks at Score Media Ventures Inc., and they don’t play when it comes to copyright laws.