- 1 Vancouver Canucks vs Minnesota Wild: Quinn Hughes comes back one point short of 500, to a team on a nine-game skid
- 2 Vancouver Canucks: nine straight defeats and no Demko until December
- 3 Minnesota Wild: Kaprizov’s 12 goals, Hughes’s 10 games with a point, and a back-to-back
- 4 Free NHL Prediction: Vancouver Canucks vs Minnesota Wild
- 5 About our free predictions
- 6 No commitment from us
- 7 Information changes
- 8 Your responsibility
- 9 Responsible gambling
- 10 Legal age
- 11 About visuals
Vancouver Canucks vs Minnesota Wild: Quinn Hughes comes back one point short of 500, to a team on a nine-game skid 
Quinn Hughes has 499 career points. The assist he picked up in Seattle on Saturday got him there, and his next point could come at Rogers Arena, in his first game against Vancouver since the Canucks traded their former captain to Minnesota last season.
The team he left is in a bad way. Vancouver is 2-9-1 and has lost nine straight, the latest a 5-2 home defeat to Detroit on Thursday. Thatcher Demko isn’t expected back from his hip injury until 21 December.
Minnesota arrives 7-3-2 after a 5-1 win at Climate Pledge Arena. Kirill Kaprizov scored on a breakaway 26 seconds in and added an assist, and he now leads the NHL with 12 goals, level with Leon Draisaitl.
Puck drop is 10:00pm ET on Sunday 25 October, 7:00pm in Vancouver. The Wild are around 1.56 on the moneyline and the Canucks 2.50, with the Wild -1.5 puck line at 2.30 and the total at 6.5. Minnesota opened at 1.59 and the price has shortened since, with the Canucks drifting from 2.42 to 2.50.
Zeev Buium, Liam Ohgren and Marco Rossi all face the team that drafted them, and Canucks coach Manny Malhotra spent part of Saturday explaining how he plans to stop Hughes, saying his team has to “defend in layers.”
I’d put the Wild’s form well ahead of anything Vancouver has shown since the first week of October. The Canucks have scored 18 goals in their last nine games, and Kaprizov alone has 12.
Vancouver Canucks: nine straight defeats and no Demko until December 
The Canucks’ last win was 4-1 over Calgary on 3 October. Since then they’ve lost to Vegas, Carolina twice, New Jersey, the Rangers, the Islanders, Florida in overtime, Tampa Bay and Detroit.
Vancouver has allowed 56 in 12 games, including seven to Carolina and nine to Edmonton, and the three-goal defeats at home to Carolina and Detroit came in the past week.
Jonathan Lekkerimaki has four goals and nine points in 12 games and a three-game point streak, and Elias Pettersson and Brock Boeser both have four points in the last five games.
Linus Karlsson has three points over the same stretch, and Arshdeep Bains and Max Sasson have two each. Ohgren, a healthy scratch on Thursday, comes back into the lineup tonight. The supporting scoring is there in patches, but Vancouver has scored 35 goals all season and conceded 56.
Without Demko, the Canucks have had nobody stop the slide. Their last nine games have produced 18 goals for and 41 against, and only the 3-2 overtime loss in Florida earned a point.
Sunday closes out the homestand, and Vancouver has lost all three home games since the Calgary win, scoring seven and conceding 14.
no renewal
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Minnesota Wild: Kaprizov’s 12 goals, Hughes’s 10 games with a point, and a back-to-back 
Kaprizov has 12 goals in 12 games, eight of his first 11 at even strength. Matt Boldy plays with him on the top line and leads the team with 51 shots on goal.
Blake Coleman scored twice in Seattle, one of them into an empty net, and Olli Maatta and Joel Eriksson Ek also scored, the latter off a Boldy rebound. Joey Daccord made 31 saves at the other end, and Minnesota had lost its previous two games before that.
Hughes is averaging 27:25 a night and has two goals and 11 assists before Saturday’s assist. He has a point in 10 of Minnesota’s 12 games, and one more takes his career total to 500.
The schedule is the one thing in Vancouver’s favour. This is the second half of a back-to-back and the fourth game of a five-game road trip, and the Wild lost to Edmonton in overtime and to Calgary in regulation at the start of it.
Jesper Wallstedt made 23 saves in Seattle on Saturday, so Calvin Pickard is likely to make his second start of the season. Wallstedt has been the first choice, but Pickard faces a team that’s scored two goals or fewer in eight of its nine defeats in this run.
Yakov Trenin has 51 hits this season and gives Minnesota a physical edge in the bottom six. The Wild are also 6-0-1 in their last seven against Seattle, a run that goes back to 12 October 2024.
Probable lineup Vancouver Canucks: Not announced at time of publication
Probable lineup Minnesota Wild: Not announced at time of publication (projected goalie: Calvin Pickard)
Free NHL Prediction: Vancouver Canucks vs Minnesota Wild
Our prediction: Minnesota Wild to win (1.56)
I’m backing Minnesota to win. Vancouver has lost nine straight, conceded 41 in that run and has no Demko, while the Wild have the league’s top goal scorer and a defenceman with a point in 10 of 12 games.
The back-to-back and Pickard’s start are the honest concerns, and they’re why this is 1.56 and not shorter. The Canucks’ scoring in this run, two goals or fewer in eight of the nine defeats, makes me think Pickard won’t need to steal it.
The puck line at 2.30 is tempting given the 41 goals Vancouver has allowed in nine games, but tired legs in the third period could keep this close, and Minnesota has lost twice on this trip already. I’d stay with the moneyline and let Kaprizov and Hughes do the rest.
in your pocket.
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