Her Wild Side Hockey Podcast

In this episode, Mikki wades into the Calder Trophy argument of Brock Faber vs. Connor Bedard. She chats about Marat Khusnutdinov's first game with the Wild and the Anaheim game generally and reminisces about The Game that happened one year ago today.

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Host

HockeySheWrote

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 hostess, Miki,

aka HockeySheWrote.

And here we are.

We have had an exciting week.

But first,

I would like to just throw back

to a special memory that

many Wild fans have,

which was one year ago today.

Today is March 15th.

March 15th of 2023 was the game.

You might not know what that means,

but maybe you will when I

tell you it was against the St.

Louis Blues.

That's right.

One year ago from today was

the game where not only did

we beat the Blues 8-5,

there was also the almost

goalie fight that rocked the world.

And Bennington trying to

hype up the crowd after

letting five goals in.

And then Goligosky scoring

and mocking Minnington.

And there were many other

things going on during that game.

There were tons of scrums.

That was the game with the

picture that looks like

Fleury is floating because

he jumped and grabbed onto

the net to get out of the

way of the puck.

I don't know.

The whole game was completely wonky.

And came out in favor of the Wild,

thankfully.

But is also one of those

games that... I mean, it was in St.

Louis,

so I'm going to guess most of us

were not there.

But is one of those that I

will never forget watching on TV.

And I will never forgive

those refs for not letting

Fleury punch Bennington

straight in the face.

Because that is what the world needed.

But one of the most

important things... And in

my last podcast, I talked about how...

Murat Uzmedinov.

There you go.

See, I'm getting better and better at it.

I wrote it down how I'm

supposed to pronounce it on

my paper so I don't look

like an idiot again.

So I talked about how he's here.

And he had his first game last night,

his NHL debut.

And I got to be there with my mom.

I'll talk about kind of my

mom's experience with her

first wild game a little later.

But there was so much cheering for Murat.

And I loved it so much.

Like, he took his warm-up lap,

everyone cheered.

First time he came over the

boards for his first shift,

everybody cheered.

Won a face-off and then another face-off,

cheered both times.

Made a couple great hits along the boards,

everybody cheered.

He left to go back to the

bench after his first shift,

everybody cheered.

Is it ridiculous?

Yes, it is absolutely ridiculous.

But everyone is so hyped to

have who's Nadina off here

that it just it felt right

to cheer everything the man does.

And I think everybody is

already in love with him.

If you saw his postgame

interview and they asked

him about all the cheering.

he had the most sarcastic

reply he was like oh yeah

two face-offs but he seems

like such a fun guy um it's

really cool that he

actually has a lot of english

Because when Kaprizov came, he did not.

And not only that,

but it took Kaprizov until

this season really to feel

comfortable speaking mostly

in English without an interpreter.

Because I think anytime that

Kirill does an interview,

I don't think they even

have the interpreter on the

phone like they used to.

And I know they have it

available for Kuznetdinov.

but he only uses it sparingly.

And I will say that like a

big shout out to him because again,

coming to a complete different country,

you're speaking a different language.

I mean,

he said that he did learn English

in school and obviously he

paid attention in his

English classes because he

seems to speak very well.

And again,

understand a lot more.

He doesn't need the

interpreter to necessarily

explain everything to him

or make sure he understands the question.

Sometimes.

But it's really fun.

And I think that

were able to connect with

him a lot more than we were

with Kaprizov.

Because Kaprizov came over,

it was the COVID year,

the shortened year.

No one got to watch him in person.

No one got to even just

watch him practice.

So it was completely removed.

And then you add to it the

fact that he was not

comfortable in English to start off with.

And we loved him.

Let's not get that wrong.

We loved him.

But it was just a little bit

harder to connect at first.

Where I feel like

Kuznetdinov is coming in

and everyone is just like, okay,

we love him.

Like off the ice, he's great.

On the ice, he had a great first game.

And I just,

I sense that this is going to

be the start of like a

really great group of

Russians that the Wild are

going to kind of slowly collect.

Now,

I do have more to say about the game

against Anaheim because, like I said,

I was there with my mother.

It was her first wild game in Minnesota.

She had actually seen them

play the Anaheim Ducks in

Anaheim previously.

But it was really fun to bring her to.

But first, I'm going to throw it over.

Nope, I'm going to do the commercial.

Okay.

Now, I...

Always like to make sure

people know how to support

the show and support the

podcast network that I am

affiliated with.

So I am putting up on a screen,

if you're watching on video,

a link to our Ticketmaster

affiliate link.

So we have a QR code here.

Otherwise,

I put a link down in the show notes.

Basically,

any tickets that you buy through our link,

we will get a cut of

Ticketmaster's profits.

So nothing, you're not paying extra.

We just kind of take part of

that as kind of like a middleman,

like we referred you to Ticketmaster.

And this is for anything, hockey games,

concerts.

I don't know, puppet shows, plays.

I don't know what you want to go do.

But if they sell tickets

through Ticketmaster,

you can use our link.

And I would really, really appreciate it.

So let me get that off.

There we go.

I'm back.

So I want to talk about the Anaheim game.

Because again,

this is my mom's first

experience in the Excel

Center watching the Wild.

She's done everything else.

She's watched the Wild away.

She has been in the Excel

Center for numerous things.

And actually, when she walked in,

she was like,

I think I was in a suite

here sometime with your dad.

And I don't know why.

And I don't remember what we

were watching or what we were doing.

But that is something that

had to do with my dad's company.

So stay tuned for the answer

to that mystery because

perhaps I'll have the answer next week.

We will see.

Not next week.

Next episode, whenever that happens.

I hyped this game up to my mom.

And I knew that it was going to deliver.

No matter how the wild plays,

seeing a game at Excel

Center is just mind-blowing.

It's not an oversell.

But the funniest part is that, I mean,

you all know my brother's

the one that has a season tickets.

So he had contacted me and been like, Hey,

can you go on Thursday?

I said, yeah,

I don't have anything on my schedule.

The problem is that I didn't

know who to go with.

You know, it's a Thursday night is hard.

Any like Tuesday, Thursday,

those are hard because not

everyone wants to go on a

weeknight where they have

to wake up earlier the next day.

Or like, you know,

I take my best friend

sometimes she lives like an

hour and a half away.

Um,

And I don't want to put that on her,

but out of happenstance,

my mother was also on spring break,

just like my kids have been this week.

So I called her up and I said, hey,

why don't you come up?

I'll take you to the game.

Since you're on spring break,

you don't have to do

anything the next morning.

So even if you drive back home,

which is an hour and a half,

even if you drive back home

you can sleep in.

And first she was like, I don't know.

But thankfully my brother

and such talked her into it.

So my brother was so excited

to have my mom use these tickets with me.

So excited.

He was texting me constantly being like,

oh,

make sure you get her some really good

food.

Get something like the pizza

or the nachos.

Don't just get her a hot dog.

I was like, yeah, yeah, yeah, I will.

I will get her that.

And oh,

we'll take mom shopping at the

hockey lodge,

but not the little hockey

lodge on club level.

You have to take her to the

big hockey lodge.

Yes, Mason,

I will take her to the main hockey lodge.

And then not only that,

he also sent her money, like on,

I don't know, Venmo or something,

and was like,

use this to buy you something.

And my mom was like, ugh.

Cause whatever way he sent her money,

it was one of those ways where like,

you can't just refuse it.

Like my mom would have had

to go through this whole

thing of like accepting it

and sending it back.

And so she just kind of like, okay, fine.

So what was really fun is we

really made an afternoon of it.

My mom and I met at about

two o'clock parked,

which is great because then

I think we got parking a

little bit cheaper and we

were able to find parking

really easily parked next to each other.

And then I took her to the

hockey lodge right away.

I said, we're going to go.

We're going to wander around.

And we wandered around.

We wandered around for like an hour or so,

mostly because my mother is

very indecisive when it

comes to things like this.

But she did end up purchasing a jersey.

She ended up purchasing a 78 jersey,

women's cut blank back.

So no certain player because

she doesn't really have

like she's not attached to

a certain player or anything.

And I do want to point out

that I have two new

purchases that I'm wearing

from the Hockey Lodge.

They had all of their pride

stuff out still.

So I am the proud owner of a

new baseball cap, which I mean,

you all know that I have

the like ball cap with or

not the ball cap,

the stocking cap with the big pom pom.

That's a wild hat.

I wear that all the time.

I needed something for summer.

So I thought this one was perfect.

And.

Okay.

Warning.

Don't get sad, folks.

Don't get sad.

Just be happy that I found

this on clearance.

I was able to pick up a

Dewey one Dewey two shirts

on clearance and, uh, they are gone.

And I'm very sad at the same time.

I got their great soda stick

shirts and I will continue

to wear it even though they

are not in Minnesota anymore.

We were so early to this game, though,

that once we wandered

around for like an hour and

finally purchased our things,

we walked down.

I took her to Tom Reed's Hockey Pub.

Just, you know,

I've been there a few times

and she's actually been

there once or twice.

So we just went in.

What was really funny is we

asked the waitress, we were like, OK,

well, what kind of shelters do you have?

Like,

what kind of white clothes do you have?

And she was like, OK,

so we're sold out of almost

everything here.

because during the boys

hockey state tournament last weekend,

they like sold out everything.

Like everyone,

they drink all of their seltzers.

Um,

they did manage to have a few that they

brought out to us.

We had some onion rings, uh,

and we just kind of sat and hung out,

but I told my mom and she

kind of doesn't understand this either.

My brother and I

We get in line at least a

half hour before the gates

open because we want to be

like some of the first people up there.

And why is that?

I don't know.

We are a little delulu and

we like to have plenty of

time to get everything done

before the warmups because

once they start and the

warmups are coming out,

we are sat and we are ready for the game.

you know, maybe a quick bathroom break,

but no, once, once the warmup start,

we are there all the way through,

you know,

the hype video and the national anthem.

And like, we are sad.

My mom was like, okay,

I don't really understand why, but

Sure.

Take me early.

And we were we were the

first people online for club level.

And I was trying to explain

to my mom because she was like, well,

like,

what if someone comes to this gate

and they just have regular tickets?

And I'm like, well, they can't get in.

She's like, well,

can they get past and then be like,

oopsies?

I was like, no, mom,

they literally cannot get in this gate.

And even if they could,

there is not like going in that door.

There is club level and suite level.

There's not like another

staircase right there down

to like go down.

You would have to go.

It just no.

And I was trying to explain

to her why club level is

why I recommend club level

for people when they ask if

it's worth it.

Klavova has basically the

same amount of like

restaurants or like food lines,

bars and restaurant

restrooms as the 100 or 200 level does.

But half the people.

So going like there's not

really a line or if there's a line,

you're only waiting in it

for a very short amount of time,

except hilariously enough.

I don't know.

I made a joke like, is it men's night?

Because between two of the

periods we went and when we

came out of the bathroom,

we walked right in the bathroom,

like right in.

No one waiting.

We came out and there was

literally a line of like 50

men outside of the bathroom.

I kind of want to be like,

are all the other bathrooms

closed on this level?

Did you guys not realize

there were more bathrooms?

Anyway.

I also was trying to explain

to my mother about some of the players.

Because it's hard to explain them.

You know,

I'm trying to explain how the

Minnesota Wild have kind of

become this team where they

pick up people that are

having kind of like a...

Honestly, a slump,

but just like they're kind

of at a plateau in their

game and whatever team

they've been on kind of is

just not utilizing them in

the way they should.

And they come to the wild

and they end up having like

this career renaissance.

You know, so I was talking about Bogosian.

He's one that in when in Tampa Bay,

he was a seventh D.

you know,

maybe playing a third pairing and

we picked him up, brought him here.

He's playing 20 minutes a night.

He helped hold the blue line

together when Brodine and

Spurgeon were out.

I mean,

he has just really revitalized his

career to a point where

he's now been resigned for

two years because he's

proven like I'm not done, you know,

despite what they thought

with the lightning,

they were going in a different direction,

but I'm not done playing.

And in a similar way,

I was trying to explain

Zugarello because he had

kind of a similar situation

where like the Rangers, you know,

send him to the stars and

the wild picked him up from there.

Right.

And, you know, I'm going to be honest.

I wasn't really watching him then,

but I just I know that he

was getting older.

And maybe that was something

that where people didn't

have as much faith in him.

He came here.

You know, Kaprizov ended up over here,

and the rest is history.

And even when he doesn't

skate with Kaprizov now,

he is still making plays

and playing spectacularly.

Same with Flower.

Even just Fleury,

I was trying to explain

exactly how special Flower is.

Obviously, my mom knows the name Fleury.

Like, she knows that he's a goalie.

She knows some about him, you know?

And I was trying to explain to her too,

that there will never be

another goalie to play a

thousand games in the league.

It is statistically impossible.

And she's like, well, what do you mean?

Like, why not?

And I said,

it's just goalies do not come

into the league at 18 anymore.

Goalies do not come in and play, you know,

a 70, 30 split for the most part.

Like that it's, it would be,

it's just impossible.

She kind of just like, okay, sure.

But besides the Anaheim game,

they played the Coyotes on

Tuesday for Pride Night.

And they had two great games.

And yes, the Coyotes and Anaheim,

that's not like they're

like the biggest competition, right?

But just the fact that they...

stifled them defensively is

a really great look going forward.

I mean,

the first time that the Coyotes

were in Minnesota,

Bukestad had a hat trick.

They scored like three more.

I think it was like six to two,

six to something anyway,

like embarrassing, embarrassing.

And this time Bukestad still

managed to get his little like FU goal in,

but

Otherwise, stifle.

And that is such a good look

coming up because they are headed to,

let's see, St.

Louis tomorrow on Saturday

and then the California trip.

And I'm assuming they're

seeing the Kings and

everything just went out of my head.

Anyway,

teams that are not going to be easy.

So I want to talk a little

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