The Minnesota Wild make the second stop on a seven-game, 13-day road trip on Monday when they face the Pacific Division-leading Vegas Golden Knights in Las Vegas.
It will be Minnesota’s first game back in Sin City since losing to the Golden Knights in six games in the first round of the Western Conference playoffs last spring. It’s the second of three regular-season meetings this season. The Wild won the first in Saint Paul, Minn., 3-2, on a Kirill Kaprizov power-play goal with 10 seconds left in overtime Nov. 16.
Minnesota got a well-deserved day off in Las Vegas on Sunday after pulling out a dramatic 4-3 overtime win at Winnipeg on Saturday night. The Wild had a 6 a.m. flight from Minneapolis on Saturday following the mandatory three-day holiday break and then had a morning skate. Following the win, the team made the 3 1/2-hour flight to Las Vegas.
As chaotic as that 18-hour day was, it didn’t compare to the final minute of the game with the Jets.
Mats Zuccarello lasered a shot from the high slot past Connor Hellebuyck on a 6-on-4 power play with 22 seconds left to tie it at 3-all. Jesper Wallstedt, who improved to 5-1-1 with a 1.87 goals-against average on the road this season, started overtime with a glove save on a Mark Scheifele grade-A chance before Matt Boldy won it 39 seconds into OT off a nice feed from Quinn Hughes.
“Long trip, and to start off positive and keep the energy up after a long day and an early flight, that’s huge for us,” said Boldy, who scored twice.
“It’s a little easier flight to Vegas than if we lost,” Zuccarello said. “Hopefully we can build off this and have a solid road trip. We’re gone for two weeks or something and hopefully we can stack up some points here.”
Minnesota, 8-1-1 in its last 10 games, improved to 10-6-1 away from Grand Casino Arena, which is being used to host the IIHF World Junior Hockey Championship until Jan. 5.
“This is a big stretch of games for us as well as a big trip,” Wild coach John Hynes said. “We’ve got six more big games (on the trip). To start off with a good win in the fashion that it was hopefully should set us up moving forward here.”
Vegas, which has lost four of its last five (1-2-2), comes in off a 6-5 shootout loss to the visiting Colorado Avalanche on Saturday.
The Golden Knights, who dropped to 4-11 in games beyond regulation and 1-5 in shootout contests, twice blew two-goal leads against the Avalanche but led 5-4 following a Colton Sissons goal with four minutes to go. But Colorado tied it on a 6-on-5 goal by Artturi Lehkonen, who one-timed a shot past Carter Hart with 1:57 to go, and Nathan MacKinnon, who had a goal and two assists in regulation, scored the game-winner in the fourth round of the shootout.
The Avalanche outshot Vegas 19-6 over the third period and overtime and finished with 100 shot attempts.
“I thought offensively we generated a lot,” Vegas coach Bruce Cassidy said following practice Sunday. “Had some good looks at the net, had rebound chances at the top of the blue paint, all the things that we wanted to do in that area of the game. … Third period, they put a lot of pressure on us in the O-zone and we weren’t able to put out a fire and choke off plays and get pucks back and sort of get a breather. I think that cost us at the end.”
Cassidy said star center Jack Eichel, who has 12 goals and a team-leading 41 points, will miss his sixth straight game with a lower-body injury but didn’t rule him out for the New Year’s Eve contest against visiting Nashville.
–Field Level Media
