Minnesota Wild GM Comments on Plan for Trade Deadline

The Minnesota Wild sit with a 18-20-5 record, good for 41 points and six points out of the second wildcard spot in the Western Conference. While it may look like the Wild are done, considering the amount of teams they need to leap frog, GM Bill Guerin isn't ready to give up on their season.

The Wild don't feel their season is lost and Guerin spoke about the team's direction moving forward the rest of the season:

There's a lot of hockey left. Just keep playing. This has been a bit of a crazy year. Bad start, coaching change, play great under (coach John Hynes) for the first 15 games, injuries to key players at the same time like I've never seen before. It seems that we've lost our way a bit, but hey look, there are some positives. We're definitely not ready to wave the white flag or anything like that. We just want to get healthy and move forward and see what we can do. If we're going to make the playoffs, we need to be a lot better than we've been. Our core guys, our big players have to be better and produce at more key times. ... I still believe in this group, and I know people are going to say I'm crazy, but I do. We don't have games to waste. We don't have time to waste. That's the reality of it.

The only way I'd do something now is if it was going to help us improve our team right now. Other than that, I like our team, I like our players. I think they have to be given a chance to perform again as a healthy group. And then we'll address the deadline when we get there. I don't think I can give you an answer today and just say, 'We're doing this' because a lot can change.

Considering the hurdles Guerin created for himself financially, it's a small miracle the team is doing as good as they are. Come trade deadline, look for Marc-Andre Fleury being a topic of heavy conversation as the future hall-of-fame netminder is a pending free agent and likely wants to join a contender for another Cup run.

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