Jesper Wallstedt is human.
That was the hard lesson Minnesota Wild fans learned late Saturday night, as the red-hot rookie goalie cooled off just a bit, and suffered his first regulation loss of the season.
Victimized for a trio of goals in the second period, Wallstedt and the Wild fell 4-2 in their lone visit to Vancouver this season, dropping their second consecutive game.
Matt Boldy and Mats Zuccarello scored for the Wild, who dominated early but failed to build on their first period lead. Wallstedt, now 8-1-2 as a starter, had 16 saves in the loss.
“The story of this game is we didn’t capitalize on the chances that we had,” Wild coach John Hynes said to reporters at Rogers Arena in Vancouver. “We carried play most of the night. We didn’t get rewarded for the effort we put in offensively, and then we had a couple self-inflicted wounds.”
Aatu Raty had a pair of goals, and another disallowed, for Vancouver, which had been winless in its previous four games.
Just seconds into the game, Wallstedt found himself under pressure, thwarting a Vancouver scoring chance, but upending a Canucks player in the process. Wallstedt was whistled for tripping on the play, which was the second penalty of his NHL career.
The Wild’s penalty killers, who have been on a hot streak lately, negated the Canucks advantage, then Minnesota took the lead shortly after getting back to 5-on-5. Zuccarello – who had served the Wallstedt penalty – grabbed the puck at center ice, kicking off a 2-on-1 rush to the net. His cross-ice pass set up Boldy’s 16th goal of the season.
Zuccarello’s assist on the play was the 242nd he has recorded in a Wild uniform, moving him into fourth place in franchise history, one better than Pierre-Marc Bouchard in the team’s record book. He nearly had another first period assist, with a long lead pass that caught Kirill Kaprizov behind the Vancouver defense, but his breakaway attempt was stopped.
After the Wild spent the first six minutes of the middle frame pushing to double their lead, the Canucks looked, briefly, like they had tied the game. After a lengthy review, officials determined that Raty had kicked the puck into the net and it was no goal.
But Vancouver tied the game for real on a broken play before the second period was half over, via a long-range shot through a crowd in front of Wallstedt. It was the first career goal for Canucks rookie defenseman Tom Willander. A few minutes later, another shot from the blue line fooled Wallstedt, and the Wild found themselves trailing despite all of their early scoring chances. The Canucks also scored on a 2-on-1 rush to make it 3-1, as Vancouver cashed in on three of their first nine shots on goal.
“I thought they just got a couple good bounces. They scored good hockey goals,” said Wallstedt, who had won seven in a row prior to Saturday. “That kind of just switched the momentum we just couldn’t get the puck in today.”
Minnesota made another push to start the third, but instead of cutting into the Canucks’ lead, Wallstedt’s misplayed puck behind the net ended up making it 4-1.
With Wallstedt on the bench and the Wild on a power play, Zuccarello put a wrist shot in to pull Minnesota back within a pair in the final minutes.
Canucks rookie goalie Nikita Tolopilo, making his third start of the season, had 28 saves as Vancouver moved to 1-1 versus Minnesota this season. They will finish their season series with the Wild on April 2 at Grand Casino Arena.
Coupled with Thursday’s 4-1 loss in Calgary, it is only the third time this season that the Wild have had back-to-back losses in regulation, and the first time since Oct. 25.
“We had a good run of winning a lot of games. For us, the message is just getting back to that as quick as possible,” Wild defenseman Zeev Buium said. “Not letting ourselves get down and kind of get out of this.”
The Wild conclude their four-game western road trip on Monday, facing the Kraken for the first time this season, in Seattle. The opening faceoff is scheduled for 9 p.m. CT.
Briefly
After missing the road trip’s first two games with a lower body ailment, rookie center Danila Yurov returned to the lineup and took his place as the middle man on the top line between Kaprizov and Zuccarello. His return meant a healthy scratch for bottom six center Ben Jones.
Related Articles
Hynes likes Tarasenko’s game, wants to see more shots
Recent scoring drought has Wild thinking power play
‘Boring’ goalie tandem behind Wild’s climb in West standings
Flames dominate late to douse Wild point streak
Nico Sturm a greater asset for Wild as he gets up to speed
Leave a Reply