In St Paul, the Minnesota Wild got 30 saves from Alex Stalock and defeated the visiting Los Angeles Kings, 5-1.
The Wild scored three goals in the third period to break open what had been a tight 2-1 lead.
“We talked about it before the game tonight with [the media]; we need to win games at home right now because we know our schedule, it’s road-dominant, and we need to make it really hard to come in here and even get one point out of us,” Stalock said. “I think you saw a team in here that made another team super frustrated. It’s getting pucks deep, playing hard and playing physical. It goes a long way.”
Ben Hutton scored LA’s only goal.
“When you start to press and you get frustrated, you work your way out of structure,” Kings coach Todd McLellan said. “You could see the mistakes at 3-1, especially at 4-1, started to leak.
“We’re not structured well enough, we’re not built well enough yet to get out of what we’re supposed to be doing and roam.”
Mikko Koivu scored his first of the season, and Gerald Mayhew, Joel Eriksson Ek, Eric Staal, and Jared Spurgeon scored for the Wild.
“We dug ourselves a hole,” Spurgeon said. “But if you’re able to win every week, the majority of your games, it’s slowly going to come. It’s not going to happen in a week, but if we keep doing this, we’ll slowly get back into a position where we want to be.”
[WATCH: All Kings vs. Wild highlights]
Jonathan Quick made 22 saves in the loss.
“[It’s] hard to put your finger on one thing [that went wrong]. It does sting when they get an early goal for sure. I thought the second period was pretty dominant on our side, but overall we have to be mentally strong and not let it get to us,” Hutton said after the game.
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