Colorado Avalanche center Brock Nelson is from Minnesota, as Warroad, Minnesota, is where he was born. He was a finalist for the Minnesota Mr. Hockey Award.
Being from Minnesota, Nelson does have some family ties. His uncle, Dave Christian, was also born in Warroad, and is the only other family member to earn a gold medal at the Olympics.
Now that Nelson claimed his very own gold medal, he is going to look for bragging rights in the Stanley Cup playoffs against his family’s favourite team, the Minnesota Wild.
"I hope to have a few more people on my side, but I know at the end of the day, you can't be a fan of all the same teams. So hopefully [I] get the bragging rights."Avalanche center Brock Nelson
Nelson has played in 25 games against the Wild. He has eight goals and six assists in those games. Along with that is a plus-minus of -9. Unfortunately, the Wild have been able to keep Nelson in check as of late, for the most part. He only has points in one of his last five games against the Wild—A three-point night that saw him record a goal and two assists this past season.
The Avalanche need some more scoring in this series than they had against the Los Angeles Kings. Yes, they had 13 goals in four games against L.A., but they were also held to two goals in each of the first two games—the final two games really making an impact on the numbers.
I expect Nelson to have a much bigger offensive impact against Jesper Wallstedt and the Wild. It might not come right away on Sunday night, their first meeting, but at some point, something should click for him.
If Nelson has a say in it, his family will have to settle for being happy for him and disappointed that their favourite team was unsuccessful in the series.
Add us as a preferred source on Google