Minnesota Frost forward Kelly Pannek (12) feeds the puck to teammate Grace Zumwinkle (13) on a goal against New York in the Dec. 1 season opener. (Jeff Wheeler/The Minnesota Star Tribune)

Last season, before they were league champs, the team now known as the Minnesota Frost was backed into a corner.

On the final day of the regular season, the Frost were on a five-game slide, hoping for an Ottawa loss to help snag the fourth and final spot in the league’s inaugural playoffs.

A Walter Cup trophy dulls the sting of slipping into the postseason by the skin of your teeth. But the Frost know: Early-season points matter.

The defending PWHL champs have won four of their first five games (4-0-1) and are the only team remaining without a regulation loss, three points clear of New York atop the six-team PWHL standings.

The Frost host the Montreal Victoire (3-1) on Saturday. A victory means the Frost will best their four victories in six games to start last season and will have beaten every other team in the league only a half-dozen games into the season.

What’s at stake

It’s not yet the new year, but coach Ken Klee knows these points add up come spring. The PWHL takes three international breaks throughout the 30-game regular season, the longest stretching from April 3-25 for the IIHF Women’s World Championships.

After last year’s break, the Frost lost seven games in a row. They stopped the skid by reverse-sweeping Toronto in the first round of the playoffs.

“When you have a three- or four-week break, it’s tough to manage how many of our players are gone, how many are still here, trying to keep the same tempo in practice when you take eight players out of your lineup,” Klee said.

Combine the stop-and-start rhythm with a short regular season — up from 24 games last year but still far less than the NHL’s 82 — and time becomes precious.

Defender Maggie Flaherty returns Saturday from a two-game suspension for illegal checking; that suspension would be equivalent to more than five Wild games.

Flaherty’s return comes as the Frost have placed defender Sophie Jaques on long-term injured reserve with an upper body injury suffered against Ottawa on Dec. 19. The Frost also signed reserve defender Charlotte Akervik to fill in for Jaques.

A fast start

The Frost’s organizational turnover turned heads in the offseason, unusual changes for a trophy-lifting team.

But their draft class has gotten off to a quick start. With 10 new players, Minnesota’s rookie group leads the league with six combined goals. Its collective 14 points are behind only New York’s 16, which has been bolstered by No. 1 overall draft pick Sarah Fillier.

Defender Claire Thompson, Minnesota’s first-round pick who opted out of the inaugural PWHL season for medical school, has a league-high six assists and is part of a defensive unit holding opponents to a league-best 24.8 shots per game.

“People are making good plays with the puck,” Thompson said. “I think we had a lot of great net-front presence on a lot of our goals, and that’s a point of emphasis for our team.”

Rookie forward Dominique Petrie was the only player to score a goal in each of her first three games. Britta Curl-Salemme netted two goals in Minnesota’s 6-3 road win over Toronto.

“Our overall depth has improved,” Klee said. “Any time when you can add, you know, arguably, a top-two (defender) on any team in the league, you can add a top-six forward on any team in the league, with Britta and Claire Thompson — right away, you know, we’re better.”

Combine that with sharp starts from returning vets Kendall Coyne Schofield, Taylor Heise and Kelly Pannek, and the Frost lead the league with an average of four goals per game, up from 2.25 last season.

“Coming in and making an immediate impact kind of makes you feel a little bit more comfortable, knowing that I can compete and I can play and I can score goals,” Grace Zumwinkle said. “It looks different for everyone, but I think when you can come in and make a stamp early on, it certainly helps your confidence.”

The Frost’s power-play success rate (30.8%) and penalty kill (85.7%) both rank second-best, after the Frost killed a league-low 67.2% last season and converted only 8.2% of power plays.

Against Ottawa, the Frost netted two power-play goals in a regular-season game for the first time. The league’s new “No Escape Rule” — delaying any line changes to the next faceoff on a penalty kill — was implemented to increase power-play scoring. But Klee pointed to assistant coach Chris “Critter” Johnson to explain the Frost’s rising rates relative to the league at large.

“Critter’s doing a good job working with them, talking to them, where they’re going to be on the ice, what situations they can be in,” Klee said. “But also, make hockey plays. He’s a big believer.”

Now it’s a matter of maintaining that level through the PWHL’s breaks and repetition and not slipping into a late-season slump like last year.

“Beginning the season, we’ve been really crisp and really sharp,” Heise said. “Last year, it was a lot of firsts. ... I think now, it’s just more the focus on the hockey piece.”