ST. PAUL, Minn. — Joel Eriksson Ek and Kirill Kaprizov each had hat tricks, and after trailing by three points in the second period, the Minnesota Wild stormed back with six scoreless goals and 10 points. They persevered, aiming for a record victory of 7 vs. On Monday, they will face the NHL-leading Vancouver Canucks.
Minnesota’s six points in 5 minutes, 45 seconds is the fastest such rate in the NHL in the past 25 years, since Washington scored six points in 4 minutes, 47 seconds in a game on February 3, 1999. Ta.
Matt Boldy, Mats Zuccarello, Marco Rossi and Jonas Brodin also scored for the Wild, setting a franchise single-game scoring record. They also had the fastest four-goal streak in team history, all on the power play, over a span of 2 hours and 17 minutes, taking a 6-5 lead early in the third period.
Zuccarello scored with 27 seconds left in the second period. The Wild switched goalie from Filip Gustafsson to Marc-Andre Fleury at intermission, and they lost momentum after the slow and sluggish Canucks wasted JT Miller’s hat trick.
Minnesota’s goals came in the first 1:44 of the third period, again by Eriksson Ek, Kaprizov and Eriksson Ek, making it 6-5. Rossi then knocked a Jake Lucchini shot off his skates at 4:48, and Kaprizov added more damage to Canucks goaltender Casey DeSmith with a shot at 5:12.
With Vancouver playing the first half of the back-to-back, coach Rick Tocchet opted to bench primary netminder Thatcher Demko to give him some rest.
Elias Pettersson scored his team-leading 29th point for the Canucks, and Ian Cole scored the first goal. Only two goals were scored in the first 15 minutes of the game against Gustafsson.
The Canucks (37-14-6) suffered seven penalties and lost their second straight game. The lead score fell to 28 wins, 7 losses, and 2 draws. Nikita Zadorov and Brock Boeser scored in the third period, and the Wild made two empty-netters to cut the lead to 8-7 with 2:08 left.
