Nick Seeler was back with the Wild on Thursday after a nearly two-week conditioning stint in the minors and although he spent a chunk of the morning skating with the team, Seeler finished the session in a familiar position: working out on an almost empty sheet of ice as a healthy scratch.
But after getting reacquainted with game mode in the American Hockey League, the defenseman is hopeful he will soon log NHL action.
"It was a great experience to get down there and get some games," Seeler said. "But I'm excited to be back up."
After sitting as a scratch for 35 of the Wild's first 41 games, including 11 in a row to close out the first half of the season, Seeler accepted a conditioning assignment to join Iowa.
"You can only bag [skate] so much," Seeler said. "The game shape is a little bit different. I feel great. I felt really good down there."
The 26-year-old appeared in six games with Iowa, tallying two assists and five shots and finishing the stretch plus-9. Whether Seeler cracks the Wild lineup in the near future will depend on how the team performs, coach Bruce Boudreau said.
A regular on the blue line last season, Seeler was projected to resume that role this season but slid out of the top six amid the emergence of rookie Carson Soucy. This season has "definitely been the toughest year for me," Seeler said, but he's focused on staying upbeat.
"I'm thinking about coming out on the positive end of it and just working through and trying to get better even though I'm not playing," Seeler said. "It's been hard. That's one of the reasons I went down to get some games so I can feel confident up here. I'm ready for that.
