You can be sure when the NHL announces the Norris Trophy winner for best defenseman in June, there will not be any Minnesota Wild blue-liners beating a path to the podium.
That is not meant to be a slight. But the hard truth is that there are no clones of Rob Blake, Niklas Lidstrom and Chris Pronger - superstars who can dominate both ends of the ice.
Teams lucky enough to have one top-tier defenseman can build power plays and systems around them. For everyone else, a committee usually does the work. On the Wild, there isn't even a chairman of the board.
Minnesota's defense corps is more like a group of staffers, some with more responsibility than others, who collectively have raised the level of their performance as they march toward the playoffs.
Entering Friday's game at Dallas, the six regulars - Willie Mitchell, Filip Kuba, Nick Schultz, Andrei Zyuzin, Brad Brown and Lubomir Sekeras - collectively had 18 goals among 73 points. On a team that isn't swimming in offense, those are not particularly intimidating statistics.
But when you consider their captain and steadiest influence, Brad Bombardir, has been sidelined three weeks with a back injury, and the Wild still have the fourth-lowest goals-against average in the league, their efforts, however anonymous, cannot be ignored.
"Very rarely do you have all six of your guys on top of their game at one time," said assistant coach Mike Ramsey, a four-time All Star who spent 18 seasons on the blue line. "But they're all very steady and tuned in to what they're doing out there in terms of their communication and stick work. These guys have to be sharp every night for them to succeed and for our team to succeed."
Sekeras and Zyuzin shade toward offense, while Brown is the most likely candidate to deliver an open-ice hit. Mitchell has grown his game exponentially, playing physical in front of the net and taking a beating behind it.
Schultz and Kuba have had lapses, but they are expected to be mainstays on defense for years and their upsides are evident.
Head coach Jacques Lemaire measures opponents not so much by how many shots they take, but rather the number of quality scoring chances they are allowed.
Minnesota's coverage has kept most of the shots on the perimeter. Shooting lanes are cleared for goalies Dwayne Roloson and Manny Fernandez to set up and make saves. Rebounds regularly are swept out of harm's way and neither netminder are forced much to scramble to make extraordinary saves.
"Our D-men have been great, and we've been able to reap the rewards," said Roloson. "We're making the saves when there are opportunities. But most of the scoring chances occur from broken plays. Otherwise, they have been there to break it up and calm things down."
Many times during the Wild's first two seasons, their scoring problems were exacerbated simply because they struggled to get out of their own end and teams would hem them in for consecutive shifts until they could ice the puck.
But their skating and positioning has markedly improved, allowing them to connect on first passes and tilt the ice the other way.
"We're not in trouble as much. We're in control," Lemaire said.
As a group, they have been able to jell through another season of familiarity, while avoiding the injuries that decimated them as a unit when Brown, Kuba and Bombardir missed 98 games among them last year.
Although the Wild have not slipped much because of Bombardir's indefinite back injury, his presence and leadership are crucial if they are to put a dent in the tank they inevitably will face in the first round of the playoffs.
"We're comfortable with our roles and we've managed, when we're all healthy, to get some pairs together who have played well together," Mitchell said. "But we all want to see Bombar back there as soon as possible."
LINE COMBINATIONS:
Stevenson-Hendrickson-Gaborik
Dupuis-Bouchard-Zholtok
Brunette-Dowd-Johnson
Laaksonen-Walz-Ronning
DEFENSE PAIRINGS:
Schultz-Mitchell
Kuba-Brown
Zyuzin-Sekeras
INJURIES: Bombardir had another pain-killing injection in his back as he continues to recover from a bulging disk that has sidelined him for 12 games.
Pain has kept the Wild's top defenseman off the ice since Feb. 25, although he started light workouts in the Twin Cities, according to GM Doug Risebrough. Before the Wild left for their recent four-game trip, Bombardir said he expected to be back before the end of the season.
Risebrough said team doctors believe he is progressing, adding that another injection might help expedite his return.
"He is working out and he is doing better," he said.
NOTES: Roloson's contract extension leaves Cliff Ronning as the Wild's lone unrestricted free agent, but the organization does not plan to negotiate with the 17-year veteran, if at all, until after the season, Risebrough said.
The Wild acquired Ronning from the Los Angeles Kings for a fourth-round draft choice during last June's draft, signing him to a one-year deal for $1.85 million that made him the highest-paid player on the team.
Ronning has been a consistent point producer and a mainstay on the power play, and he repeatedly has said he wants to stay in Minnesota.
"I still feel I can contribute in ways. But that's not up to me," he said.
**** Richard Park was a healthy scratch for the first time March 18 at Tampa Bay as Lemaire found himself in a numbers crunch at forward.
Darby Hendrickson and rookie Pierre-Marc Bouchard had been in and out of the lineup, and Lemaire wanted to reward tough guys Matt Johnson and Jeremy Stevenson for fighting twice in an ugly 5-0 loss to Columbus.
"They deserved to play. They went to war for our club. I had to find another guy," said Lemaire. "We're very satisfied with what (Park) gave us. Last couple of games, he could be better."
"I'm not happy about it, but what are you going to do," said Park, who was one of only three players (Cliff Ronning, Antii Laaksonen) to play in every game. "Just have to try to play better."
-Fanhome.com
