It feels like forever ago that goaltender Filip Gustavsson was a Vezina Trophy contender.
Suddenly, the Wild don’t know which player is going to show up between the pipes on a nightly basis.
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After posting a shutout in an impressive win over the Carolina Hurricanes a few weeks ago, Gustavsson has struggled mightily over his past five starts while looking nothing like himself. He has a 0-4-0 record in that span to go along with a 5.27 goals against average and a .844 save percentage.
The only game the Wild have won with Gustavsson as the starter during that stretch was a comeback win over the St. Louis Blues, when he was pulled in favor of future Hall of Fame goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury.
It’s been rather disastrous other than that as Gustavsson allowed six goals in a loss to Colorado, four goals in a loss to Vegas, five goals in a loss to Edmonton, and, most recently, four goals in a loss to Utah.
“It’s been a little tough,” Gustavsson said. “It feels like we practice hard and try to do the right thing and then it doesn’t translate right now to the game.”
The calmness that seemed to define Gustavsson earlier this season is nowhere to be found. He hasn’t looked very confident in the crease, and because of that, he hasn’t been able to string together sustained success.
This blame shouldn’t fall squarely on Gustavsson’s shoulders, however, as his teammates haven’t always been up to the challenge in front of him. That much coach John Hynes made abundantly clear as he emphatically came to the defense of Gustavsson following the most recent loss.
“We can’t be any softer at the net front than we were tonight,” Hynes said. “I’m not even talking about goaltending tonight.”
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Some of the shortcomings Hynes pointed to included a lack of energy, a lack of competitiveness and a lack of execution.
“We can go down the list of what it was,” Hynes said. “It wasn’t a good night.”
A similar sentiment was echoed by some of the leaders in the locker room after the game.
“We gave them too much easy offense,” winger Mats Zuccarello said. “That was not good enough.”
That said, Gustavsson is the last line of defense whenever he’s on the ice, and even if his teammates are struggling, sometimes he has to be the player who carries them. He proved he could do that earlier this season as the Wild established themselves among the best teams in the league.
How can he get back to that level of play?
“Just keep playing my game,” Gustavsson said. “It’s going to translate, hopefully next game I get to start.”
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