Red-hot Kirill Kaprizov named NHL's First Star of the Week
Where would the Minnesota Wild be in the standings if Kirill Kaprizov hadn't missed the first two weeks of January after getting cross-checked in his back against Winnipeg on Dec. 30?
With 10 goals and seven assists in his last 10 games, the Wild are 7-3 with Kaprizov in the lineup. In the seven games he missed with the reported broken ribs, the Wild went 1-6 and scored a combined nine goals in the six losses.
His recent efforts earned him the NHL's First Star of the Week award on Monday. Kaprizov had five goals and three assists in four games over the past week.
Although Kaprizov was just one of a handful of key Wild players who missed time to start January, he was on a roll before the injury and his scoring ability was sorely missed for two weeks.
He had scored five goals in the five games up to the injury and since his return to the lineup he's added five goals in five games, all of them in the past two contests, which were Wild road wins over the Panthers and Hurricanes.
Minnesota (20-21-5) is six points behind Nashville for the second wild card in the Western Conference. Kaprizov and the Wild are back in action Tuesday in St. Paul against the Washington Capitals.
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.