Marc-Andre Fleury suffered injury in Wild loss to Nashville
It's unclear how long the Minnesota Wild will be without their No. 1 goalie, but Marc-Andre Fleury suffered an upper-body injury against the Nashville Predators Tuesday night and he's expected to miss time. How long?
"Don’t know. He’s being evaluated this morning," said Wild head coach Dean Evason.
Specifics about his injury haven't been revealed, and it's unclear when he got hurt because he played the entire game and made 23 saves, blanking the Predators over the final two periods after giving up two goals in the span of 44 seconds in the opening period.
Fleury has a 2.80 goals-against average and .906 save percentage this season, but over his last eight games he's been vintage with a 1.75 goals-against average and .937 save percentage. He allowed 18 goals in his first four starts and has surrendered just 14 in his past eight games.
Filip Gustavsson will take over the No. 1 goalie role while Fleury is out. He owns a 2.81 goals-against average and .918 save percentage for the season, but has stopped 89 of the last 94 shots he's faced for a .947 save percentage.
"He’s given us a chance every night that he’s been in there," Evason said of Gustavsson. "We feel very, very confident with him in the net."
Joe Smith of The Athletic reports that Zane McIntyre will be called up from the Iowa Wild to be Gustavsson's backup. McIntyre was a standout at the University of North Dakota after winning the Frank Brimsek Award as the top senior goalie in Minnesota high school hockey as a star student-athlete at Thief River Falls.
Sounds like it'd be Zane McIntyre who'd be getting the callup for #mnwild if needed here with Marc-Andre Fleury injury. He's played in eight NHL games with the Bruins. Obviously Gustavsson the starter for now. Fleury being evaluated
— Joe Smith (@JoeSmithNHL) November 16, 2022
Fleury is the latest key player to be bit by the injury bug, joining Jordan Greenway, Marcus Foligno, Brandon Duhaime and Ryan Hartman. Greenway has played in just two games this season and Hartman has been out since Oct. 30 with an upper-body injury.
The Wild host the Pittsburgh Penguins at 7 p.m. Thursday.
Title: Bring Me The Sports co-owner, editor Email: joe@bringmethenews.com Twitter: @JoeBMTN Education: Southwest Minnesota State University Location: Minneapolis, Minnesota Expertise: All things Minnesota sports Nelson has covered Minnesota sports for two decades, starting his media career in sports radio. He worked at small market Minnesota stations in Marshall and St. Cloud before joining one of the nation's highest-rated sports stations, KFAN-FM 100.3 in the Twin Cities. There, he was the producer of the top-rated mid-morning sports show with Minnesota Vikings announcer Paul Allen. His radio experience helped blossom a career as a sports writer, joining Minneapolis-based Bring Me The News in 2011. Nelson and Adam Uren became co-owners of Bring Me The News in 2018 and have since more than tripled the site's traffic and launched Bring Me The Sports in cooperation with the Sports Illustrated/FanNation umbrella. Nelson has covered the Super Bowl and numerous training camps, NFL combines, the MLB All-Star Game and Minnesota playoff games, in addition to the day-to-day happenings on and off the field of play. Nelson also has extensive knowledge of non-sports subjects, including news and weather. He works closely with Bring Me The News meteorologist Sven Sundgaard to produce a bevy of weather and climate information for Minnesota readers. Nelson helped launch and manage the Bring Me The News Radio Network, which provided more than 50 radio stations around Minnesota with daily news, sports and weather reports from 2011-17.