Wild successfully operating goalie shuffle with Marc-Andre Fleury, Filip Gustavsson

Injuries have shuffled the Wild's forward lines and defensive pairings throughout the season.

The team's crease has also become a revolving door, but for a very different reason.

That position is being debated on a game-by-game basis with Marc-Andre Fleury and first-year backup Filip Gustavsson helping make the Wild one of the toughest teams to score on in the NHL over the past few weeks.

"It's nice to have the option of either one of them," coach Dean Evason said.

This platoon continued Thursday, with Fleury getting the start against Dallas at Xcel Energy Center after Gustavsson was in net for a 4-1 win at Winnipeg on Tuesday coming out of the holiday break.

Gustavsson also handled the game before the schedule paused, and that was the first time the Wild stuck with the same goalie for consecutive starts since Fleury rattled off three in a row Dec. 4-9.

But from the next game on, there's been an almost 50-50 split in action, which is quite the change from how the season began, when Fleury started six of the first seven and 10 of the initial 12.

Look at his performance: Over his past 10 games, the 24-year-old is 7-2-1 with a 2.07 goals-against average and .927 save percentage.

During that stretch, he went on a career-best six-game win streak that's tied for the third best in the league this season. Since Nov. 19, he leads the NHL in goals-against average (1.74) while tied for third in save percentage (.936) for goalies who have played at least eight times.

"We didn't just give him those games," Evason said of Gustavsson, whom the Wild acquired in an offseason trade with Ottawa that sent Cam Talbot to the Senators. "He's pushed to get those games."

Fleury has been sharp, too.

While the Wild went on a season-best 6-0 run from Dec. 10 to 21, the veteran gave up only three goals in three appearances while hitting the 10-win plateau for the 18th time in his career. Only Martin Brodeur (20) has more 10-win seasons than Fleury, a three-time Stanley Cup champion and future Hall of Famer who re-signed a two-year, $7 million contract with the Wild in the summer after the team brought him in from Chicago at last season's trade deadline.

The Wild have five prospects skating in the World Junior Championship, which kicked off Monday in Canada.

Jack Peart picked up his first point in the United States' Day 1 win, David Spacek (Czechia) has a pair of two-point games, and Liam Ohgren scored in Sweden's tournament-opening victory; Ohgren was drafted in the first round, 19th overall, by the Wild earlier this year.

Caedan Bankier (Canada) earned his first point, an assist, on Wednesday, and Servac Petrovsky has twice logged almost 20 minutes of action for Slovakia.