One day after Mikael Granlund returned to game action, the Wild had another injured forward making notable progress Wednesday.
Nino Niederreiter, who has been out since Oct. 12 with a high left ankle sprain, went through a pre-practice skating session with Andy Ness.
"I think he's going to the pregame skate with us [Thursday]," Boudreau said, adding that he'd only talked to Niederreiter about it, and not the athletic trainers.
Asked if these developments make it possible Niederreiter will be back practicing with the team Friday, Boudreau said, "I go with what [the athletic trainers] say, but as a coach, hopefully that might be the case. When I asked [Niederreiter], he had just come off, and Any Ness said he'd done really good with the stops and starts and stuff."
