As far as Minnesota Wild forward Marcus Foligno is concerned, the key to regaining control of his team’s first-round playoff series is staying out of the penalty box.
That’s it. Simply keep the same number of players on the ice as the Dallas Stars.
“They’re looking to play 5-on-4,” Marcus Foligno said. “That’s their game. They can’t hang with us 5-on-5. So we’ve just got to be smarter, and myself included.
“But it’s a heated game out there.”
The heat figures to intensify when the Wild face off against the Stars on Wednesday night in Game 3 of their best-of-seven Western Conference quarterfinals series in Saint Paul, Minn. The series is tied at 1-1 after the Wild took Game 1 and the Stars responded to win Game 2.
Stars coach Glen Gulutzan heard about Marcus Foligno’s 5-on-5 comment, but he shrugged it off as Game 3 approached.
“He’s probably emotional or whatever,” Gulutzan said. “I don’t know if we need (bulletin-board material). We’re just going to keep doing what we’re doing and grind this thing to where we need it to go.
“Obviously, I don’t agree with it.”
The pace of play increased dramatically in Game 2 as both teams traded high-quality scoring chances. One key difference was that the Wild committed eight penalties totaling 16 minutes, which paved the way for the Stars to capitalize on the power play.
Wild coach John Hynes said he felt better after rewatching film of Game 2. He never likes seeing his team lose, but he said the team’s mistakes were correctable and not a sign of a larger, more foundational problem.
“Going back through it, I thought we did a lot of good things,” Hynes said. “… The thing I love about our group is we’re extremely competitive. Even if you (compare) the two games, I think from a competitive aspect of the game, we were there, we didn’t take a step back in that area.
“I think now it’s just understanding that we have to play with emotion and not (be) emotional. There’s a difference in that. To me, that’s controllable.”
One thing the Wild cannot control is the health of injured forwards Mats Zuccarello and Yakov Trenin. Zuccarello was a late scratch before Game 2 because of an upper-body injury, and Trenin left in the first period Monday after absorbing a crushing check from Stars forward Colin Blackwell.
Hynes said he was not sure whether either forward could play in Game 3. If not, he said, there is a chance that the team could dress 11 forwards and seven defensemen instead of the usual combination of 12 forwards and six defensemen.
“That is something that is on the table,” he said. “But also, you look at 12 and six, and you look at the intensity level of playoff games and things like that, I think you want to take that into consideration as well.”
The Stars’ Jake Oettinger and the Wild’s Jesper Wallstedt likely will start in net for the third straight game of the series. Oettinger is 1-1 with a 3.54 goals-against average and an .879 save percentage in the series, and Wallstedt is 1-1 with a 2.02 GAA and a .932 save percentage.
–Field Level Media
