Wild still confident despite allowing 13 goals in two games
Gone are the thrilling feelings from scoring a franchise-record 10 goals in a win over Vancouver on Monday. Those exciting feelings have been replaced by negative emotions after losing 6-3 in Winnipeg Tuesday night — yet somehow, the Wild remain confident.
Minnesota's 10-goal outburst against the Canucks also overshadowed the fact that they allowed seven goals in that victory. Add six more finding the back of the net Tuesday night and the Wild have been bludgeoned for 13 goals in 48 hours.
What made the loss in Winnipeg more painful is that a win would've put the Wild in a tie with St. Louis for the final playoff spot in the Western Conference — and it snapped Minnesota's six game points streak (5-0-1),
Still, somehow confident, even though goalies Marc-Andre Fleury and Filip Gustavsson have a combined save percentage of .759 (41 saves on 54 shots) the last 120 minutes of hockey.
“I don't believe we gave them too much,” Fleury said after the loss in Winnipeg. “It was two tips in the third, a change of direction, a power-play goal that was a nice play back door, a couple shots I didn't see. So, I didn't think we got played by any means. Not to worry. Put that one behind and keep going.”
Minnesota coach John Hynes seemed quite pleased with the offensive output in the loss, with Marco Rossi scoring twice and Kirill Kaprizov netting his 24th goal of the season.
“I thought we generated quite a bit. I think that we certainly should have had more goals than we did tonight,” Hynes said. “Unfortunately, they didn’t go in. But I thought the chance generation, expected goals, chances for, (offensive) zone time, lots of those things were in our favor, but didn’t get in tonight, so I think we’ve got to bear down. The process to get to those chances was good, but when you get that many looks and you’re that attacking offensively, you’ve got to find a way to find it get to the back of the net.”
Up next: Wild at Edmonton, 8 p.m. CT Friday.
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Title: Bring Me The Sports co-owner, editor Email: joe@bringmethenews.com Twitter: @JoeBMTN Education: Southwest Minnesota State University Location: Minneapolis, Minnesota Expertise: All things Minnesota sports Nelson has covered Minnesota sports for two decades, starting his media career in sports radio. He worked at small market Minnesota stations in Marshall and St. Cloud before joining one of the nation's highest-rated sports stations, KFAN-FM 100.3 in the Twin Cities. There, he was the producer of the top-rated mid-morning sports show with Minnesota Vikings announcer Paul Allen. His radio experience helped blossom a career as a sports writer, joining Minneapolis-based Bring Me The News in 2011. Nelson and Adam Uren became co-owners of Bring Me The News in 2018 and have since more than tripled the site's traffic and launched Bring Me The Sports in cooperation with the Sports Illustrated/FanNation umbrella. Nelson has covered the Super Bowl and numerous training camps, NFL combines, the MLB All-Star Game and Minnesota playoff games, in addition to the day-to-day happenings on and off the field of play. Nelson also has extensive knowledge of non-sports subjects, including news and weather. He works closely with Bring Me The News meteorologist Sven Sundgaard to produce a bevy of weather and climate information for Minnesota readers. Nelson helped launch and manage the Bring Me The News Radio Network, which provided more than 50 radio stations around Minnesota with daily news, sports and weather reports from 2011-17.