Recapping Sunday's NHL action including the excellent goaltending performances of Quick, Lundqvist and Andersen…

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Apologies for the late ramblings. I'm covering for Dobber and we got our signals a bit crossed up.

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Yesterday started off with a highly competitive matinee between the Kings and Wild. Once again the Wild played a ferocious possession game against one of the West's elite only for their finishing woes to cost them.

The Wild outshot the Kings 41-16, yet lost 2-1. First thing, you simply don't just beat up on the Kings from a possession perspective. They don't normally let that happen. But the Wild were relentless in their possession game. They've really put a lot of focus on gaining clean zone entries and early going it shows as they appear to be establishing good offensive zone possession at a high rate by activating their defensemen and carrying it over the blue line.

The Wild also have some absolutely tenacious fore-checkers in Zach Parise, Nino Niederreiter and Charlie Coyle to name a few. It all adds up to a game plan that has given some of last year's elite teams fits.

It will be interesting to see if the Wild can maintain this pace for an entire season. They've only played four games so far, one of the lightest early schedules of any team so fresh legs are on their side. They do have some great depth up front, which allows them to deploy their forwards in specific roles.

For instance, none of their top-six forwards skated more than 21 seconds on the penalty kill yesterday. Part of this is because of the disciplined game the Wild play taking very few penalties but also because they allow their bottom-six forwards to do the grunt work.

This is nothing new for the Wild as they did much of the same thing last season. It's just interesting to see it play out.

Parise continues to skate like his ass is on fire. He's working like a maniac, which, I mean, he is kind of a maniac but he's working maniacally, even for him. He fired off another six SOG to give him 27 for the season. He won't maintain that pace but as long as he's healthy he's getting over 300 SOG for the first time since 2009-10, which was also the last time he cleared 80 points. It's looking good on that front too.

If the Wild are going to move into the league's elite they are going to need more scoring. I'm sure they were counting on free agent addition Thomas Vanek to bring some of that to the table but so far he's been a bust with just one assist in four games. He has 13 SOG in those games so the chances are there.

I haven't watched enough Wild hockey to say for certain if Vanek is up to his old lazy tricks but it doesn't appear to be the case. He's an extremely streaky player so it wouldn't shock if it took him an entire month to get going. Plus, it's only four games in. Not worth fretting about.

The Wild have to be concerned about their power play. All the possession in the world won't make up for a weak power play. The Kings can attest to that. They've been a possession monster the past few years but have consistently churned out subpar regular season finishes because of their inability to score. At least part of the problem has been the power play and that's certainly an issue for the Wild now.

The Wild went 0/5 on the power play and still haven't clicked for a power play goal this season. That obviously won't continue to be the case but it doesn't mean their power play will be good. And if that's the case, no one in Minnesota is going to have great scoring totals, not even Parise, who again, is playing like a possessed man.

Niklas Backstrom got the start for Minnesota, his first of the season. He didn't get enough action for me to say how good he looked. I'm not too concerned about Darcy Kuemper losing starts though.

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For the Kings it continue to be That 70's Line that is churning out scoring for them. Tyler Toffoli led the way with a goal and an assist. While Jeff Carter and Tanner Pearson each had a point of their own.

These guys are operating at an unsustainable pace considering their usage. Of the group, only Carter sees consistent top unit power play time. The other guys skate predominantly on the second unit, which has actually been the more productive unit so far but unless Darryl Sutter clues into that and starts skating the second PP more than the first, we'll see Pearson and Toffoli with dwindling scoring totals. It should be mentioned that Toffoli has been seeing top unit time with Marian Gaborik out. But it still feels like the time to sell high is now.

Eventually, we'll see the top line scoring more, whenever it gets intact. Marian Gaborik is currently out with an injury, to no one's surprise and Justin Williams is struggling to recreate his magic from last spring because that was otherworldly scoring.

With Gaborik out Mike Richards got some run on the top line with Anze Kopitar and Williams. It didn't last long as he took a 10-minute misconduct following a fight with Christian Folin and eventually finished with 19 PIM for the game. He also notched a power-play assist skating on the second unit where one of his passes took a fortuitous bounce fight to Toffoli in the slot with a flat-footed Backstrom unable to offer much resistance. You create your own luck to be sure but Richards, supposedly in the best shape of his career, looks sluggish.

What else can one say about Jonathan Quick? He's one of the best in the game. 40 saves on 41 shots. Just a beauty of a performance after shutting out the Blues on 43 saves just a few nights before.

In news unrelated to the game that was played, Slava Voynov has been suspended indefinitely by the league following a domestic violence arrest this morning. This could wind up amounting to nothing as it did for Semyon Varlamov last season but you have to respect the league's stance on this after the NFL came under fire for their backwards take on domestic violence.

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After a dreadful start Henrik Lundqvist is getting it on track. He shutout the Sharks on 33 shots yesterday. He did need some help from Matt Hunwick on the goal line but for the most part he played a great game.

Rick Nash, much like Parise, is playing great to start the season. He scored his league-leading seventh goal of the season and landed five more SOG. Like Parise, health is somewhat of a concern for a player who has been mostly healthy until last season's woes but he should clear 300 SOG once again if healthy.