Iowa Wild vs. Henderson Silver Knights - Fight For Playoffs

The Iowa Wild vs. Henderson Silver Knights match will happen on Friday, 18th March. The Stanley Cup playoffs for this year are just around the corner. This season of the National Hockey League has reached near its halfway mark. The standings of the league are changing a lot after every match. It is difficult to predict the teams that are going to make the playoffs right now. For a long time, a handful of teams have continued to dominate the NHL year after year. Still, it is not easy to say who will be in the playoffs this year, despite the fans making their own guesses. So, the Iowa Wild vs. Henderson Silver Knights match is important for both teams.

Iowa Wild vs. Henderson Silver Knights Previous Match

In the previous Iowa Wild vs. Henderson Silver Knights National Hockey League match, the former was defeated by a close margin of one goal. The Wild forward Connor Dewar got his name registered on the scoreboard a couple of times. But there were more than three tallies in the penultimate period and more than a couple in the final minutes of the match from Henderson that helped them seal the victory on that night. The Henderson forward Colt Conrad took a shot from the top of the left circle. It went past the opposition goalkeeper Dereck Baribeau in the starting moments of the Iowa Wild vs. Henderson Silver Knights match to give his team the lead.

Then, Wild forward Mason Shaw made things equal in the match when he took a shot after a good hold and dragged the shot to goalkeeper Logan Thompson's right eight minutes after the first goal. Connor Dewar got the required assistance from Shaw to get that goal. After some time, the Henderson forward Jonas Rondbjerg had a powerplay goal when he got a rebound opportunity to the left of Dereck near the end of the first period to give his team the lead again in the match. His team maintained that lead going into the first break. This is despite being outshot by the opposite team in the first period. Iowa forward Kyle Rau gave a great pass from the top of the left circle on the powerplay. The defenseman Dakota Mermis took a good shot past the goaltender to tie the match again at the start of the following period. Rau was the lone player from Iowa to give an assist on the play.

About four minutes after that goal, Dewar got into the left circle and shot off the put using his wrists past the goaltender on the power play of that period. The goal was assisted by Rau and Mermis and gave the Wild a lead for the first time in the match. After the end of a couple of periods of the match, the Wild led the match by one goal and led in total shots taken. The team had outshot Henderson by more than ten shots in this period. In the following period, Dewar had another goal for the match. This happened after Will Bitten developed a turnover in the neutral zone. The player went into the offensive end and took a snap shot by Thompson to give the team a lead of two goals. Bitten had an assist on the goal. Later, the captain of the Wild, Cody McLeod, pushed a puck through a mob of players in front of the Henderson goal and past Thompson to increase the lead of the Wild even further. Iowa forward Dominic Turgeon assisted on this goal of the match.

A few minutes later, Henderson forward Pavel Dorofeyev had a goal as he had a lucky break. A clearing attempt from Wild went off a stanchion and went directly in front of the goal of Iowa. His goal came on the power play of this period and shortened the margin between the sides to two goals. Thompson was pulled out for the extra attacker with only a few minutes left for this period. The Silver Knights attacker Ben Jones tapped in a pass from attacker Matt Boudens late in this period to close the margin to one goal. Once again, Thompson was on the bench for another extra attacker. Rondbjerg got another goal for the match using a wrist shot underneath the right faceoff dot to tie the match. 

The Silver Knights center player Jake Leschyshyn got another rebound opportunity to give his team a lead of a single goal. The Wild pulled out Baribeau to get in an extra attacker with only a minute remaining in the match. But the team could not tie the match to send the match into overtime. This handed the Silver Knights a close-fought win to end the weekend series. The shots in the final period were in favor of the Wild. The team also led the match in total shots taken at the end. Both Henderson and Iowa were equal on the power play conversions in the match. 

Iowa Wild vs. Henderson Silver Knights: NHL Standings

Conclusion:

The Iowa Wild vs. Henderson Silver Knights match is important because the teams are still vying to get a place in the playoffs for this season. There is still a long way to ensure that these teams play in the playoffs. But it is not impossible considering the present form of both the teams. The Iowa Wild vs. Henderson Silver Knights match is very important for both teams in this context.