The Wild's Kirill Kaprizov is expected to play Thursday after a longer-than-expected break for injury. (Carlos Gonzalez/The Minnesota Star Tribune)

And the clearest signal that Kaprizov and Spurgeon would be back is that the Wild reassigned defenseman David Jiricek two hours after practice. If you did the salary cap math, it really was the only option to get below the cap ceiling once Kaprizov is activated from LTIR.

Leading Wild goal scorer Kirill Kaprizov has missed multiple games with a lower-body injury, but his return could be imminent.