Neal: Wild’s Frederick Gaudreau bounces back, lands in prominent NHL playoff role against Vegas

Frederick Gaudreau’s offseason home is about an hour east of Montreal in a Quebec resort town called Bromont. He was there when his response to a challenging 2023-24 season began.

“When I go back home, I get with my family,” Gaudreau said. “We’re in nature. Nature is very healing for me. So, it was spending time in nature, working and all that. And I felt re-energized pretty fast.”

This season has been one significant rebound for Gaudreau, who has provided scoring depth while being utilized in various ways by Wild head coach John Hynes.

The Wild on Sunday will begin their 14th postseason with a first-round visit to Las Vegas. Gaudreau enters with 18 goals — one shy of his career high — 37 points and a minus-2 rating. Not gaudy numbers, but his potential as a secondary scorer looms heavily in this series as the Wild are finally healthy after being undermanned for five months because of injuries.

Hynes has the best player on either team in Kirill Kaprizov. No. 97 is expected to do superstar things. It’s fine when great players are playing great. Hynes understands that in the postseason, anyone can contribute.

And everyone must.

“Playoff series are like that,” Hynes said. “Sometimes the top players cancel each other out, and then you are going to need some depth scoring.

“In a series, it can’t just be, you know, the guys that you think are supposed to score all the time. There needs to be different types of guys that make big impacts.”

Gaudreau, the Wild’s fifth-leading scorer during the regular season, is fully capable of providing a goal or two in this series.

“My mindset is just on [being] game on and preparing for it right now and trying to fill up the energy to be the best version of myself,” he said. “And I think my mindset is just about staying in that moment.”

Gaudreau needed a reset. After scoring 19 goals and notching 38 points in 2022-23, he scored just five goals in 67 games in 2023-24. He downplayed it during an interview at Tria Rink on Thursday, but he took a hit to the rib cage from big hitter Ryan Reaves during the second game of the regular season, something he dealt with the rest of the campaign. He played in just 66 other games, spending some time on long-term injured reserve.

He landed in the crosshairs of a Wild brass that identified him among the players they wanted to see more from this season. Fans wanted him out of town. Gaudreau maintains that his stats didn’t reveal everything he endured during the season.

This is a reminder that it’s OK to give a player another chance following a poor season. There’s a professional baseball team in town that has either sold low or given up on players, only to see them flourish elsewhere.

Gaudreau returned this season healthy and mentally refreshed. He played in all 82 games. His shooting percentage of 16.4% is a career high, and he has had three multigoal games. The Wild wanted more from Gaudreau, and Gaudreau obliged as he responded to the adversity he faced.

Hynes on Thursday also spoke of the recent improved play of forward Marcus Johansson. When Johansson and Gaudreau are on the ice together, the Wild are two-thirds of the way toward having a redemption line. When Mats Zuccarello has joined them, the line sparked the Wild at times this season.

“He’s been one of our more consistent two-way centermen,” Hynes said of Gaudreau. “I think he’s back to having good poise on the puck. I think he’s been using his shot. His production this year has been really important to us.

“I would say this year, compared to last year with him, I think the consistency and reliability that he’s been able to play with night in and night out has allowed him to produce at a high level for us.”

The Golden Knights enter the postseason as the No. 2 seed in the Western Conference while the Wild are No. 7. Because of extended injury absences for Kaprizov and Joel Eriksson Ek, a healthy Wild team is more than a seventh seed.

The Wild enter the series re-energized by being fully healthy.

Gaudreau, however, has been re-energized all season.