Prospective Look at Minnesota

Winning the Northwest Division takes quite the team and Minnesota had that team this season, capturing their first division title in their franchise history and this summer, they'll need to do a lot of work to get themselves back up to the pinnacle of the toughest division in the NHL. With a core group of players signed on, the Wild will likely lose a number of guys to unrestricted free agency and will have some toiling to do with their restricted free agents.

The Wild have 12 of the regular players signed on for next season, which leaves 11 open spots for their full roster for next season still open. Their current salary number sits at around $33.8 million, which gives them a fair amount of room to move. Fortunately for the Wild, they have been growing a lot of their own drafted talent, which accounts for most of their salary increases for next season.

Forwards	Defense	Goaltenders
Marian Gaborik	Brent Burns	Niklas Backstrom
Mikko Koivu	Kim Johnsson	Josh Harding
Eric Belanger	Nick Schultz
Mark Parrish	Martin Skoula
James Sheppard
Derek Boogaard

Currently, the Wild only have 6 forwards signed on for next season and they will have Pavol Demitra, Brian Rolston, Branko Radivojevic, Todd Fedoruk and Chris Simon go to unrestricted free agency, while Pierre-Marc Bouchard & Stephane Veilleux will become restricted. That would account for the normal starting line-up at forward for Minnesota and it will be GM Doug Risebrough's job to pick and choose who will stay and who will go. Bouchard and Veilleux will likely stay since they are still restricted free agents, both qualifying for arbitration. Demitra, Rolston and Simon are rumoured to be on their way out, but that isn't definite by any means.

At the back end, the four defensemen that they have were all important players, gaining valuable experience this past season. Brent Burns, a member of the World Championship Team for Canada, has been gaining even more experience as a top-level defender and should have his stock increase over the summer. Kurtis Foster is the only starting six defenseman on the team that is heading for restricted free agency (also qualified for arbitration), while Sean Hill, Petteri Nummelin and Keith Carney are all subject to unrestricted free agency. None of the three seem likely to return, possibly seeing the Wild go in a different direction for their sixth and seventh defensemen.

In net, they will have the tandem of Niklas Backstrom and Josh Harding coming back. Both keepers had very productive seasons for the Wild and the experience they gained will only make them better keepers going into next season. A possible upgrade on the blueline would also make their jobs that much easier.

There are a few gaps that the Wild can fill to make themselves a better team. Some good experience in the forward position and a solid sixth defenseman will likely be the targets for the coming summer of work. The Wild will also choose from the 24th spot in the Draft, likely to take the best available player, possibly investing some talent in goal or to get a big forward that could possibly make a quick jump.