Wild rally in third to defeat Sharks, 5-4

The Minnesota Wild benefitted from two goals from Mikko Koivu  as he netted the game-tying and winning goals in a 5-4 win over the San Jose Sharks Thursday.

“When it’s a one-goal game, there’s a lot of time left,” Koivu said. “You’re just trying to get the pucks deep and create that forecheck and shoot it as much as we can. I thought we did that, and we got the extra one at the end.”

The Wild were derided for signing Eric Staal in the off season but he has kicked in for the Wild and he added two goals in the victory in San Jose.

Zach Parise also scored for Minnesota who improved to 24-9-4 on the season.

“We started to move our feet a little bit in the third. We started to play a little smarter at the offensive blue line. Got it below their [defensemen] and forced them into some turnovers. That’s how we got a lot of pucks back, and that’s how I think we got all of our goals, really,” Parise said as the two teams scored six goals in the final frame.

The Sharks had a 2-1 lead going into the third and a 4-2 lead early in the period on a goal from Patrick Marleau before the Wild responded.

“They came out in the third and played well. I don’t think we handled their pressure coming as well as we would have liked,” San Jose’s Justin Braun said. “Hopefully, we can learn from that. We just weren’t breaking out as clean as we were in the first two periods. When they were in the zone, I don’t think we were closing as fast as we should. We gave them too much time.”

San Jose lost its third straight and also had goals from Joonas Donskoi, Joe Pavelski and Joel Ward.

They fell to 23-14-2 on the season.

WATCH: All Wild vs. Sharks highlights

Devan Dubnyk picked up the win on 30 saves.

Martin Jones took the loss on 21 saves.

“They seemed to get all the loose pucks,” Jones said. “They were hungrier around the net than we were. It was a grind. Pucks were just bouncing around. We were really good for two periods. It’s one of those things. They get a couple bounces, they get some momentum, and they really started buzzing there in the third.”