Skip navigation
Favorites
Sign up to follow your favorites on all your devices.
Sign up

Wild goalie Gustafsson joins Swedish League team

Minnesota Wild v Philadelphia Flyers

Minnesota Wild v Philadelphia Flyers

NHLI via Getty Images

Johan Gustafsson’s headed home.

Gustafsson, who’s spent the last two years with Minnesota’s AHL affiliate in Iowa, has reportedly returned to play in his native Sweden with Frolunda, per the club’s Twitter account.

Gustafsson, 23, was the Wild’s sixth-round pick (159th overall) at the 2010 NHL Entry Draft but became something of a prized commodity in 2011-12, when he posted great numbers with SHL team Lulea (.929 save percentage, 1.74 GAA, six shutouts) and backstopped the Swedes to gold at the 2012 World Juniors in Alberta.

One year later, Gustafsson was on the roster for Team Sweden as it captured gold at the Worlds.

In North America, though, Gustafsson failed to replicate the same sort of success. He never posted impressive numbers in Iowa -- spending a brief time with ECHL Alaska this season -- and was stuck behind a logjam of goalies at the NHL level: Niklas Backstrom, Darcy Kuemper Josh Harding and, in the latter half of this season, Devan Dubnyk.

Gustafsson, a pending RFA, never appeared in a regular-season game for the Wild but was called up on a few occasions, most notably in the middle of last season when Harding was dealing with complications from multiple sclerosis.