Story by
Pioneer Press, St. Paul, Minn.
Wild: Quinn Hughes’ early numbers are loud; his plans remain quiet
- Story byPioneer Press, St. Paul, Minn.
- Wild: Quinn Hughes’ early numbers are loud; his plans remain quiet
For all of his on-ice flash, Quinn Hughes is reserved once the skates come off. His answers are often clipped. He is all business in his approach to hockey, and with the media.
During seemingly every game this season, the Minnesota Wild have sent out an update on what team or NHL record Hughes happens to be threatening, or breaking. He set a franchise record for points by a defenseman last season, recording 53 despite playing just 48 games in Minnesota.
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With two more assists in Thursday's 5-4 win over St. Louis, Hughes now owns the franchise record for a scoring streak to start a season with 12 points in eight games. His 1.5 points per game pace would give him 126 by season's end.
He may be hard to hear in a media scrum, but he is impossible to ignore on the ice.
"I mean, he's a special player. His patience with it. The way he controls, even if he likes the whole play," said Blues captain Robert Thomas. "Gives them a ton of time and space and speed entering the zone. I didn't think we did a good enough job checking him, making it harder on him."
Hughes' style of spinning and stopping and starting to play an advanced version of keep away is legendary, but he's also focusing on getting pucks to the net this season, and the results are pucks in the net. True to his "keep it simple" nature, there is no grander plan when Hughes shoots the puck.
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"I'm just trying to get it in there and you never know if it goes in or not," he said after the game.
Coach John Hynes acknowledged that coaches like to get Hughes and his defensive partner on the ice with the Wild's "big line" of Kirill Kaprizov, Joel Eriksson Ek and Matt Boldy — all of whom love to attack the crease with productive results.
"They want the puck at the net, too. It's not like us five are just perimeter (players)," Hughes said. "All three of them take their turns at the net. So, they're down there. Ekky and Kirill were down there, and I just tried to get it down to them where they can make a play."
And for all the numbers and records and points and wins, and all the Wild fans showing up wearing sweaters with Hughes' No. 43 on the back, perhaps the franchise's most nagging question hangs over everything that has gone on so far, and everything that will go on between now and the trade deadline.
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Hughes, who came here less than a year ago in a trade that cost Minnesota the equivalent of four first-round picks, can become an unrestricted free agent on July 1 next summer. There has been voluminous speculation about whether he will sign an extension here, whether he wants to play elsewhere, whether he wants to join brothers Jack and Luke in a package deal, or whether Wild general manager Bill Guerin can find a way to bring his brothers here.
From the player, the agent and the GM, the message through the summer, through training camp and now into the regular season, the message has remained the same:
"These things take time."
With the impact Hughes is making on the ice, a contract worth $20 million per season or more is not unrealistic. But true to his reserved nature, when asked about numbers, Hughes remains reticent.
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"I've always thought that I don't care if I have a slow start or a hot start," he said, a day after turning 27. "It's obviously better to have a hot start, but over the course of 82 or 84 games, it evens out."
By the 84-game mark, at this pace, the Wild's team record book will have Hughes' photo emblazoned on the cover. And if all goes the way the fans would prefer, he will have several more years in Minnesota to eclipse his own records.
