The Minnesota Wild continue to roll under new head coach John Hynes.
Kirill Kaprizov scored his fourth goal in four games, and Marc-Andre Fleury made 19 saves to pull within two games of passing Patrick Roy on the NHL’s career wins list as the Wild beat the Boston Bruins 3-2 on Saturday at Xcel Energy Center.
Joel Eriksson Ek and Marcus Foligno also scored for Minnesota, which has won six of its past seven games and is now 10-3-0 since Hynes replaced Dean Evason on Nov. 27.
Fleury, who made 40 saves in a 4-3 overtime victory at Boston on Tuesday, was sharp again, stopping two one-on-none breakaways to keep the game close before the Wild took a 3-1 lead in the third period.
He has won three of his past four starts and now has 550 career victories, one shy of tying Roy, currently second behind Martin Brodeur (691) on the NHL’s career leaderboard. Fleury, 39, also is two games shy of becoming the fourth NHL goaltender to play 1,000 games in his career.
Boston quickly went up 1-0 on a power-play goal. With Kaprizov in the box for holding the stick, David Pastrnak sent a slap shot from the left circle through traffic and found the back of the net at just 2:37.
Minnesota played just well enough to keep it there after one period, then dominated the second.
With Ian Mitchell in the box for roughing Kaprizov on a Wild breakout, Matt Boldy sent a sharp wrist shot on goal that Linus Ullmark couldn’t contain. Joel Eriksson Ek kept the puck alive and was credited with the goal when Brandon Carlo accidentally put it in his own net to make it 1-1 at 5:57.
Less than 90 seconds later, Kaprizov gave the Wild a lead when he completed a give-and-go with Alex Goligoski, somehow getting a shot off from the slot in traffic to beat Ullmark and make it 2-1 at 7:22.
The Wild outshot Boston 19-6 in the second period and started the third in the same fashion, drawing a cross-checking penalty on former Minnesota center Charlie Coyle 1:07 into the frame. Minnesota mounted an active attack with the man advantage but wasn’t able to score.
Seconds after the power play expired, however, Pat Maroon took a pass on the goal line and threw it into the crease for Foligno, who powered it past Ullmark for his fourth goal of the season, and a 3-1 lead at 3:10.
The Bruins, playing the second of back-to-backs after a 5-1 loss Friday in Winnipeg, pulled within 3-2 on a goal by Morgan Geekie with just over 6 minutes remaining.
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