So much of hockey is dissected then categorized, with running tallies kept for nearly every atom of the action — from shots, goals and points to blocks, faceoff wins and hits.
Wild captain Mikko Koivu has already been singled out for his proficiency in many of those areas, sitting atop a host of the leaderboards in the team's archives.
But the recognition Koivu is set to receive Sunday afternoon against the Stars at Xcel Energy Center might be the most fitting one that's been bestowed on him to date.
The reliability and resilience required to achieve a longevity milestone like 1,000 regular-season NHL games are attributes that have come to define Koivu's career with the Wild.
"During the season, you're so into it," Koivu said. "You just worry about the next one. That's the job that we gotta do. I think that's the challenge in this league. That's why it's so hard. That's why it's so hard to stay in it."
Koivu will become the 55th player in NHL history to play his first 1,000 games with the same team, the 342nd player overall to reach the plateau and just the seventh to accomplish the feat in a Wild sweater.
His wife, Helena, and their three children, Sofie, Kasper and Oskar, will be in attendance Sunday, along with Koiuv's parents and brother Saku after flying in from Finland.
Before retiring, Saku — a former captain of the Montreal Canadiens — logged 1,124 regular-season games. He and Mikko will become the sixth set of brothers in NHL history to each skate in 1,000 games, per NHL Stats.