The Wild, seeking a road sweep of the opening two games of their first-round NHL playoff series against Dallas, instead saw the Stars storm back for a 7-3 blowout on Wednesday night. Here are five takeaways from Game 2:
1. The Stars' stars came to play
The Wild won Game 1 on Monday 3-2 in double overtime in large part because they kept Dallas' top scorers from dominating the game. Jason Robertson and Roope Hintz each scored a goal, while Jamie Benn and Miro Heiskanen each contributed an assist.
That changed in a big way Wednesday night in Dallas.
Led by Hintz' hat trick and an assist, that quartet – Dallas' top four scorers with Joe Pavelski out injured — combined for four goals and eight assists in the Stars' 7-3 romp. Heiskanen contributed four assists, Benn had a goal and an assist, and Robertson chipped in with two assists. During the regular season, those four players accounted for 117 goals and 208 assists.
Wild center Frederick Gaudreau felt his team didn't play responsibly in its zone.
"It starts when we're not cheating the game and are playing strong in our zone and on their blue line,'' Gaudreau said in a KFXN-FM interview. "That's when we create our chances. Tonight, we cheated a little bit in those areas, and that's why they got their chances.''
2. Wild special teams far from special
The Stars got four goals from their special teams – one shorthanded and three on the power play.
The Wild allowed only three shorthanded goals during the regular season, the fewest in the NHL. On Wednesday, however, the Stars pounced while shorthanded to take 1-0 lead.
With Wyatt Johnston off for hooking, Kirill Kaprizov turned the puck over at the blue line, and Hintz sped past Marcus Johansson before snapping a shot past goalie Marc-Andre Fleury at 4:14.
Dallas made it 2-0 with their first power-play goal of the night when Tyler Seguin tipped in Robertson's shot at 11:20 of the first. That came 3:30 into a high-sticking double-minor on Jake Middleton.
The Stars stretched their lead to 3-1 with their second power-play goal of the game, and fourth of the series, at 4:07 of the second. Wild defenseman Jon Merrill took a cross-checking penalty, and Benn needed only 19 seconds on the man advantage to beat Fleury.
Minnesota's second chance on the power play connected when Johansson backhanded a shot past Stars goalie Jake Oettinger at 11:56 of the second, cutting the Dallas lead to 4-2.
The Stars, however, finished 3-for-6 on the power play with Hintz' third goal coming at 12:16 of the third. Dallas also killed two Wild power plays early in the third as Minnesota finished 1-for-5 with the man advantage.
"We've got to stay out of the box,'' Wild coach Dean Evason said in the postgame news conference. "… We don't want 6-on-5 games. We'd rather settle it 5-on-5. We have to be better in that department.''
3. 'Quist' feeds 'Qvist'
Down 2-0 in the first and outplayed for most of the period, the Wild got back into the game when a pair of their trade deadline acquisitions teamed up.
On a three-on-two rush started by Stars enemy No. 1 Matt Dumba, Gustav Nyquist took a pass from the defenseman and backhanded a pass to Oskar Sundqvist, who was charging to the right side of the crease. Sundqvist, in his Wild playoff debut, deflected the puck past Oettinger at 16:11, trimming the Dallas lead to 2-1.
In the second, Nyquist fed Gaudreau on the goal that cut the Dallas lead to 4-3.
4. Decisions, decisions
In Game 1, goalie Filip Gustavsson made a franchise-record 51 playoff saves, including 27 in the two overtimes, as Minnesota edged Dallas 3-2. On Wednesday, Evason opted to stick with the rotation he'd used down the stretch, starting Fleury in goal.
While Fleury certainly didn't get the tightly played defensive effort in front of him that Gustavsson enjoyed – three of the Stars' goals came on odd-man rushes and three were on power plays — he still gave up seven goals.
Fair or not, when the Wild cut the lead to 4-3 in the second period with two goals in 11 seconds, they needed Fleury to shut the door. He couldn't deliver. First, Evgeni Dadonov's perfectly placed redirection made it 5-3. Then, an errant pass by Johansson sent Hintz on a breakaway. Fleury went for the poke check, but Hintz diagnosed the move and scored for the three-goal lead.
"Nothing was on Flower tonight,'' Evason said. "It was all on us.''
Would the Wild have won if Gustavsson started? No one knows, but Evason's decision did raise eyebrows before the game and did go against the grain of riding a hot goalie.
Afterward, Evason was asked what Gustavsson had to do to earn consecutive starts.
"I don't know how to answer that because both goalies have earned, obviously, to be in the net,'' the coach said. "We made the decision to go with Flower. They had a shorthanded breakaway and [three] power-play goals. What would you like Flower to do? He made some incredible saves for us.''
Presumably, the decision for Friday's Game 3 in St. Paul is Gustavsson back in goal. The question is: Will Evason scrap the rotation on Sunday's Game 4 or stick with it?
5. Keep 'em separated
Bad blood between the teams started in the series opener, with the Stars angry about Dumba's hit that knocked Pavelski out of the game, and the Wild hot over the repeated cross-checks that Dallas defenseman Ryan Suter delivered to Kaprizov.
When the winner of Game 2 became apparent, the third period took on an edge as four Wild players – Kaprizov, Marcus Foligno, Ryan Reaves and Brandon Duhaime – plus the Stars' Max Domi, Suter and Benn – received 10-minute misconduct penalties.
With that as the backdrop, Friday's Game 3 at Xcel Energy Center shouldn't lack intensity.
"It's playoff hockey,'' Evason said. "There's a lot of emotions. There's going to be emotions in every game.''
The Star Tribune did not send the writer of this article to the game. This was written using a broadcast, interviews and other material.
