The Minnesota Wild and Vegas Golden Knights will play Game 2 of their first-round playoff series on Tuesday, April 22. Vegas, which won Game 1 by a score of 4-2, will be looking to extend its lead, while the Wild will be desperate to open its account.
Projected Lineups for Minnesota Wild vs. Vegas Golden Knights
Vegas, who won the Pacific Division yet again this season, also went 3-0-0 in the regular season series against Minnesota. They won their fourth straight game against the Wild on Sunday, April 20. However, the game was much closer than the Golden Knights would like, with the Wild tying it at 1-1 before losing the lead to a power-play goal from which they never recovered.
“We made more plays than them at the end in the offensive zone to secure the win. I think you’ll see a similar game on Tuesday. I don’t think either team is going to try to get away from what they do well. It’s too early in the series,” Vegas coach Bruce Cassidy said via NHL.com.
For the Wild, the return from injury of star forward Kirill Kaprizov and center Joel Eriksson Ek wasn’t enough to clinch victory in the series opener.
“Hard fought game from both teams and what we expected,” Wild coach John Hynes said after Sunday’s game. “Both teams came to play hard and had pretty strong defensive efforts. Not a lot of special teams and I thought we did a lot of good things to build on moving forward.”
On Tuesday, the team’s front office announced they were recalling eight players from the franchise’s AHL affiliate, the Iowa Wild, to boost their bench. They also had rookie defenseman Zeev Buium, who was selected in the 2024 NHL Draft, become the first player in franchise history to make his NHL debut in the Stanley Cup Playoffs.
Golden Knights Projected Lineup
Forwards
Ivan Barbashev — Jack Eichel — Mark Stone
Brandon Saad — Tomas Hertl — Pavel Dorofeyev
Brett Howden — William Karlsson — Reilly Smith
Tanner Pearson — Nicolas Roy — Keegan Kolesar
Defensemen
Nicolas Hague — Zach Whitecloud
Brayden McNabb — Shea Theodore
Noah Hanifin — Alex Pietrangelo
Goaltenders
Adin Hill
Akira Schmid
Scratched
Ben Hutton
Kaedan Korczak
Victor Olofsson
Cole Schwindt
Injured
None
Wild Projected Lineup
Forwards
Kirill Kaprizov — Joel Eriksson Ek — Matt Boldy
Marcus Johansson — Frederick Gaudreau — Mats Zuccarello
Marcus Foligno — Marco Rossi — Gustav Nyquist
Yakov Trenin — Ryan Hartman — Justin Brazeau
Defensemen
Jacob Middleton — Jared Spurgeon
Jonas Brodin — Brock Faber
Zeev Buium — Zach Bogosian
Goalies
Filip Gustavsson
Marc-André Fleury
Scratched
Vinnie Hinostroza
Declan Chisholm
Jon Merrill
Injured
None
