Wild Warmup: Minnesota at Anaheim

The Essentials

The Opponent

Winners of three-straight games, the Anaheim Ducks are in the midst of a five-game homestand. Two of their past three victories have come in overtime or the shootout, including a 3-2 overtime victory over the Arizona Coyotes last time out on Friday night. Anaheim is led offensively by veteran center Ryan Kesler, who has 15 goals and a team-leading 34 points. He is one of three Ducks with at least 30 points. Rickard Rakell has a team-high 16 goals.

Connections

• Wild coach Bruce Boudreau was head coach of the Ducks for parts of five seasons between 2011-16, compiling a record of 208-104-40 and helped Anaheim to four-straight Pacific Division titles.
• Wild forward Chris Stewart played in 56 games with the Ducks last season, scoring eight goals and 20 points.
• Ducks defenseman Clayton Stoner was a third-round pick of the Wild in 2004 and had 31 points with Minnesota between 2009-14.

Trading Places

Bruce Boudreau returns to Anaheim for the first time since being named Minnesota Wild Head Coach on May 7. Before joining the Wild, he led his teams to eight division titles in nine NHL seasons. He became the fastest coach in NHL history to reach the 400-win milestone (663 games) and leads all active NHL coaches in point percentage (.661, 433-201-85). This season, he became the first head coach in NHL history to lead three different teams to win streaks of at least 10 games, also accomplishing the feat with Anaheim and Washington (Elias Sports Bureau). After earning a point Saturday, Minnesota has clinched best points percentage in Central Division (through Jan. 10) so Boudreau will coach at the NHL All-Star Game in Los Angeles Jan. 27-29.

At the Rink

Playing the second half of back-to-back games, the Wild did not skate on Sunday morning.
Here are the projected lineups:
WILD
Zach Parise - Eric Staal - Chris Stewart
Jason Zucker - Mikko Koivu - Mikael Granlund
Nino Niederreiter - Erik Haula - Charlie Coyle
Jason Pominville - Tyler Graovac - Kurtis Gabriel
Ryan Suter - Jared Spurgeon
Jonas Brodin - Christian Folin
Marco Scandella - Matt Dumba
Devan Dubnyk
Darcy Kuemper
DUCKS
Andrew Cogliano - Ryan Kesler - Jakob Silfverberg
Joseph Cramarossa - Rickard Rakell - Corey Perry
Nick Ritchie - Antoine Vermette - Ondrej Kase
Logan Shaw - Chris Wagner - Jared Boll
Cam Fowler - Sami Vatanen
Hampus Lindholm - Josh Manson
Kevin Bieksa - Brandon Montour
John Gibson
Jonathan Bernier