Shoot!

(It just happened to be a coincidence that I thought of this video and we are playing the Ducks today)

Tonight, the Wild open up a brief 2 game road trip in Anaheim. And as the team still is trying to find consistent scoring from lines 2-4, they can certainly help themselves by doing one thing: Shoot the puck.

The Wild come into tonight's game with the 4th lowest shots per game average in the league (27.1). They had at least 30 shots in each of their first three games, but since, they have totals of 27, 16, 26, and 25. They have been doing this, despite having one of the higher Time on the Power Play numbers in the league, with 48:33 of total PP time (11th best in the NHL).

But perhaps the most alarming stat out of all of this, is the 3rd period shots, or lack thereof, this team is getting. Through their first three games, they were averaging 11 shots on goal in the third period. But in the 4 game since, they are just averaging 4 (Yep, you read that right, 4) shots on goal in the third period. And miraculously, this team has won 2 of those games, and they have earned 5 out of a possible 8 points.

And during all of this, Zach Parise has fired 30 shots on goal, which ranks 3rd in the NHL, behind scoring leaders Patrick Marleau and Thomas Vanek (Both have 33 SOG).

(This is the part of the post where you cue up Greenlay saying "Every shot is a good shot!")

Now getting back to tonight's matchup, the Wild find themselves playing a Ducks team that comes in with a high goals for (3.2 GPG-8th best in NHL) average, and the same goals against average (3.2-10th worst in NHL). The Ducks have had inconsistent play from Jonas Hiller in the past few years, and they have a more offensive minded defensive core.

So Mike Yeo's pregame message tonight should be pretty plain and simple: Shoot the freaking puck! (He may choose to replace freaking with another word beginning with the letter f)

Even if its like Goldbe...er...I mean Russ Tyler, and he takes a shot from his own blue line (As you can watch in the video at the top), please, shoot the puck! Because sometimes just taking the shot, is better than trying to find the perfect shot.


Follow Giles on Twitter @gilesferrell