In Which We Talk Wild Lore and PWHL Minnesota

In this episode, Mikki talks about the Wild's first game against the Preds before their second game. She also touches on the PWHL Minnesota game against Montreal and her first experience with media credentials.

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Creators & Guests

Host

HockeySheWrote

Wild Hockey Fan | Cozy Mystery Writer | Mom of 2 | MN Raised | She/Her | Hockey Takes that No One Asked For

What is Her Wild Side Hockey Podcast?

Her Wild Side combines hockey knowledge with a side of vibe checks. The weekly show will have game breakdowns, any topical news about the MN Wild, and fun things going on surrounding Wild's social media. This show aims to be informative while also sparking good conversation about the Wild and hockey in general without having to keep everything serious.

hello welcome to her wild

side hockey podcast I am

your host mickey aka hockey

she wrote and I am coming

at you with episode 23 and

I kind of can't believe

I've done 23 episodes I'm

excited for any and all of

you that listen or watch uh

thank you anyway so this is

the morning of the

predators game it's thursday

Wilder going to play the

Predators tonight.

And you know what?

We're coming off of a good

game against the Capitals.

We're on a pretty good run right now.

And, you know, I looked back at,

we have played the

Predators one time this season so far.

And that was the night,

beat them six to one.

That was the night that

Dewar got his hat trick.

So, you know, and he actually ended up,

he had a hat trick plus an assist.

He had four points.

I didn't look it up,

but I'm assuming that's

probably a career high for

Dewar or matching a career high.

And I just, I feel like, you know,

can Dewar do that again?

Wouldn't it be great if he

went out there again and

scored another hat trick?

I think it'd be great.

Gustafson was in net for the

first Predators game.

He'll also be in net tonight.

Fleury is still out,

but this morning at practice,

John Hyten said that Fleury

is day-to-day and kind of

made it sound like he could

be back for Saturday.

Um,

so we'll have to kind of just watch and

see how that shakes out.

Uh,

Wallstead is still up here in Minnesota.

You know, he's not going to play.

They're not going to put

them on the ice unless they have to,

because again,

Fleury is going to be back soon,

but I think it is cool to

let Wallstead just have the

experience of being up here.

And I don't remember where I heard this,

but I remember hearing that

having Wallstead spend time

with Florian Gustafsson,

like in training camp and

when they went to Sweden,

it was almost kind of an

eye opener for him to see

exactly how they prepare

themselves and how they treat themselves.

You know, what they eat,

how much they rest, everything.

all of that kind of stuff,

maybe stretching or, you know,

he just seeing what they do,

it really kind of helped

Wallstead shape more of

what he does as a young goalie now.

So even just having him sit

up here on the bench, I feel like,

you know, because it's only what,

this is maybe the third

game I think he's been up

here because it's only kind

of a short amount of time.

I feel like it is a good

experience for him to,

to be at that level.

you know, still at the NHL level,

but just watching and kind

of seeing what Gustafson is

doing in the net.

So that night, the last Predators game,

we also had Marcus Foligno fought Shen.

And then, okay, I tried to find,

apparently big physical

scrums do not make the

recap highlight reels

because I tried to find this.

At the end of the first period,

there were like four penalties.

Two of them were Kaprizov

and Boldy and then two of

the Predators players.

And they were all for roughing.

And so I was trying to find, like, okay,

I don't remember, like,

what was this scrum?

What was going on?

Apparently those do not

count as part of the highlight reel,

which I think is a little disappointing.

I did not watch, though,

to see if fighting actually

ends up on the highlight reel.

I'm assuming maybe not.

Who knows?

But this was also the game

where we had that really

great Jake Middleton goal,

that backhand up over the

goaltender far side.

Just that was kind of the

start of Midzi is an offensive player now,

you know,

like like that really kind of

kickstarted this nice

little career high goals

run that he is on.

And speaking of that,

there are quite a few

players who are working on

career high years again.

And it's kind of amazing that, I mean,

this keeps happening.

And I know everyone, oh,

the Wild aren't good.

Oh, they suck.

Oh, they're mad.

But you know what?

Actually,

I feel like with the salary cap issues,

which we all are very aware of,

it's still like developing

these players who are not rookies,

you know?

So I'm talking about like Jake Middleton.

I'm talking about Connor Dewar.

I'm talking about Brandon Duhane, you know,

where they just keep kind

of getting better or even Julie Erickson.

You know, he's had kind of like every year,

a career year.

So it's just been nice to watch that.

And I did love Middleton did.

an interview with the great Kevin Gorg.

And that was the one where

they were promoting the

tarps off ticket package,

which I would love if any

of you got one of those,

I would just please post a

picture because I just

think they're so funny.

And I love the idea that I

would love to shake the

hand of whoever came up with that idea.

I feel like I also said that

last time and I don't care.

I will say it twice because

they deserve two handshakes.

But in the interview, Kevin Gorg was like,

hey, well, Middleton, you know,

you're on a career year and

you're on pace for double digit goals.

And Middleton just kind of

laughed and he was like,

let's just go for number eight.

And I love that because he's

not changing his game completely.

in a way that's bad.

You know, like he's adding to his game,

but he is still doing all

of the other things that he

normally does.

So he's not like, hey, yeah,

I want double digit goals.

Let's go for it.

He's like, you know what?

If it happens, it happens.

I'm doing what I need to do.

And he really has been so

much fun to watch.

When Middleton came and on the ice,

off the ice, everyone loves Middleton.

And this kind of rolls right into,

I have started building, building,

that sounds like I've just

been doing really intense work.

I started building an

ultimate guide to Minnesota wild lore.

And this is like I knew it

was going to take some time,

but this has taken this is

taking more time than I thought it would.

And I think it's because as I'm writing it,

I keep remembering things.

You know, I went into it just kind of like,

oh, yeah,

we've got Capriza for this

little teddy bear.

We've got, you know, the.

obviously Middleton, you know, tarps off,

we've gotten all that stuff,

but it's like,

I can just keep remembering things.

And so I'm almost to the

point where I'm like,

do I build a different page

for every player and then

just link them all like on a main page?

Is that too much?

And I'm, you know,

I'm only really deep dive

into the Minnesota wild vibes.

So I would love to know if any of you know,

if other players,

fan bases have this much

lore in their team?

Is this just a Minnesota

state of hockey thing?

I mean, obviously every team has some,

you know, every team has some, but again,

the wild is just, it's extensive.

So I am toying with going

for multiple pages and

And the only tough part

about this is that I cannot

simply work on the lore.

I have to also write all of

the other stuff.

But I'm trying to get it out.

We'll see.

We'll see what I can get done.

And then I,

most of you probably saw on one

of my social medias that I

had a really exciting day yesterday.

I know there are quite a few

people out there that

wonder about writing about hockey,

being a hockey journalist.

And I think it's funny

because I don't necessarily,

I guess this is probably

totally imposter syndrome,

but I do not really like

necessarily think of myself that way.

I don't know what I think of myself as,

but

I got an email saying that I

had credentials.

And that's the first time

this has happened.

Now, to be fair,

I've only been writing

about hockey... Let's see.

I started a year ago, actually.

And then I didn't really

pick up the pace until

probably September.

So September, October, November, December,

I'm in kind of my fifth

month of really hardcore.

And...

My editor for Inside the Rink was like,

well,

do you want to write about the PWHL?

I was like, yeah, for sure.

You know, it's fun.

I really want to help

promote this league and the team.

And so he had put in for

credentials and I just kind

of like surprise.

It was only a couple hours

before the game.

And so I was just like so nervous.

I got there.

I got my own press badge and

I was kind of like, are you what?

What?

Like, again, imposter syndrome, 100%.

Everybody has it.

But I was, like, shaking.

Like, as I was trying to, you know,

figure out how to get up to the press box,

where do I sit?

What do I do?

I was shaking.

And I hope people did not

see that because they'd be like,

what is wrong with this lady?

Like, who is she?

How did she get credentials?

But I guess I kind of

covered it up well because

there was another writer

who was a couple seats down from me.

And it was also her first time.

But after the game, she asked me, oh,

how do we get down to the

press conference?

And I was like, I don't know.

It's my first game.

And she was like, oh, really?

I thought you knew what you were doing.

So I put on a very confident face,

which is good for me

because I feel like I do

not have a confident face.

So we will see.

I got to go down into like

the bowels of Excel Center

for a press conference.

I mean, it was just it was so cool.

It was a really cool experience.

And so, I mean,

if other people are out

there and you want to be a writer,

hockey writer.

Honestly,

the only thing I can tell you is

just grab hold of

opportunities because that

is what's happened for me.

I've literally had

opportunities dropped in my lap.

And I have grabbed on and

just run with it.

Yeah.

And you know what?

That's actually good life

advice for anything in general.

If you have an opportunity, job-wise,

going on a trip, joining something,

a club, a team, do it.

If you actually

wholeheartedly want to do it,

grab hold of it and go.

You can't sit back and forth.

Sometimes you just have to commit.

And if it doesn't work, it doesn't work.

But if it does work, it's amazing.

And I mean, I have a whole...

backstory of like throughout my adult life,

these kind of opportunities.

And I'm not going to bore

you with it right now.

But I mean, for me,

it has spanned multiple jobs,

career fields.

Yeah.

Just grab hold of things.

Anyway, back to PWHL.

I love the vibes of a PWHL

game because even though

there are less people,

I feel like they can be just

as loud as a full rink for the wild.

And I know people are going

to jump on that and be like, no,

they can't.

How can they be the same as like 15,

000 people?

Okay, obviously not.

But the excitement,

it just builds to where you

would think there were more people there.

And I love that the vibes

are so almost like party-like.

between the puck drops, you know,

so like commercial break,

everyone's dancing, everyone's singing,

having fun cameras, you know,

it's just exciting.

Whereas I feel like

sometimes at the wild game, yeah,

people have fun there.

Obviously I have fun there.

I've told you about that before,

but it can feel very like intense.

you know,

very like intense and like an

aggressive way was kind of

how I explained it in my

recap that was published this morning.

And I will link my recap in

the show notes if anyone

wants to read it.

But I don't know, it feels different.

And I think it's because

there are so many girls

hockey teams that come

together and what an

amazing experience for them.

They come together with their friends.

They've all got their like

matching jerseys on.

And for many of them,

it's probably the first

time they've seen a

professional women's hockey game.

And it's such a good experience.

Everyone is there because

they really want to be

there and they really care

about women's hockey.

The attendance last night

was five thousand and one.

And again,

I'm sure people would scoff at that.

But you have to remember,

it was a Wednesday night,

like just a random middle

of the week Wednesday night.

And for people who say that

nobody watches women's sports.

Five thousand people.

I mean, they can only build from there.

Now, unfortunately,

they did pick up their

first regulation loss.

which was tough.

It was kind of a tough game to watch.

They,

they actually put 42 shots on goal

and the other teams,

Montreal's goalie was just amazing.

Like standing on her head.

They only managed to get one goal.

Montreal managed to get two.

So it was a pretty close, tight game.

And again,

fun to watch even with the loss.

So unfortunately,

the other thing is that the

loss kicked them down in

the standings because coming in,

Minnesota was number one in

the standings and Montreal

was number two.

But now it's reversed.

So but again,

it's only that was the fifth

game of the season for Minnesota.

There is so many more to go.

And I'm excited, again,

just to see it build.

I do like that they are

allowed to be a little more

physical in the PWHL than

they have been in other leagues,

in other places.

Because physicality is a part of hockey.

And I'm not going to get

into the whole fights, no fights debate.

That's kind of a separate issue.

But just physicality needs

to be a part of it.

it's hard to play hockey without, you know,

that other physical element

without pushing somebody

off the puck without, you know,

pinning them to the board

so that you can get it.

I mean, I,

I think it does make it more

exciting to watch also.

So, um,

I will hopefully be going as media

for more games.

Um,

I actually didn't ask

because it was just like

one of those like don't

look a gift horse in the mouth.

So I don't know,

but I guess I will just find out.

And with that being said,

we're also working on

getting a few like single

game media passes for me for the wild.

And I would love to see how

that compares to PWHL.

media.

Obviously,

I know it's like more intense

and there's yeah, it is what it is.

Let's see.

There's just a few more

things that I want to say

before we wrap up.

First of all, I have my own merch now,

which maybe you have seen.

And I'm really excited.

And let me tell you,

I so the shop has actually

been up for a little while,

but I wanted to order some

of the stuff myself because

I didn't want to be like, hey,

buy these shirts and then

have them be like not good quality.

But let me tell you both.

I got a sweatshirt and I got

a T-shirt and I'll show you

I'm actually wearing the T-shirt.

So sorry for anyone who's

listening to audio,

but I'm going to stand up

and you're going to see my shirt.

And it says hot girl hockey club.

because we're all in the hot

girl hockey club.

Um, and we have stuff that says that,

which I know not everyone

wants to wear that.

That's fine.

We also just have with my

logo and her wild side

hockey podcast on there.

Um, the t-shirt is really nice and soft.

It's long.

You know,

I always like when it's a little

bit longer, the sweatshirt is super comfy,

cozy.

I ordered that like two

sizes bigger than I normally would.

Cause I want it to be just

big, you know,

like oversized and it's again,

so comfy and good quality.

So, um,

there's one more thing I'm going to

do here.

And again, this is not a, um, audio thing,

so you'll have to bear with me,

but I will keep talking for

anyone who's just listening.

We have a new partnership at inside the

So if you are looking for

tickets to anything, not just hockey,

you know,

this can be concerts or anything

that's sold through Ticketmaster.

I would love if you would

use our link because we are

trying to find ways to just

help support our shows and

support our audience.

writing and just the site in general.

So I now have on the screen

a slide with a QR code.

And that is a way that will

take you to with our

affiliate link to Ticketmaster.

And this is actually good for 30 days.

So if you click into this

link and then you purchase

tickets within 30 days,

It will help support our

show and all the other

shows on the inside the rink network.

So we have a couple of other

affiliate things.

I I'm not going to throw

them all at you right now,

but I will link other ways

to support the show in the

show notes because.

Yeah,

we just we enjoy what we do and we

want to keep doing it.

So anyway.

Thank you all for watching my content.

Once again, I'm rambling.

I should just stop.

I'm really grateful.

I'm really grateful for everybody who...

takes in my content I'm just

really grateful for all the

opportunities so um until

next time hopefully the

predators game goes well

tonight pwhl plays back to

backs on friday saturday on

the east coast and the wild

also plays saturday so

there are plenty of games

coming up I'm gonna have to

make like two more episodes

for all of those games

So, um,

until then you are all beauties and

everyone is a part of the

hot girl hockey club.

See you next time.