With rainy weather overtaking their pre-game celebration plans, the Wild opened the doors early to a handful of fans to come into the Xcel Energy Center to watch the hometown Twins play the Detroit Tigers on the scoreboard. With the game in the balance entering the ninth inning, the Wild made the call to pull the plug on the Twins game to go to the in-house feed. Boos rained down and most of the crowd made its way to the concourse to finish with the baseball game before worrying about the hockey game in front of them.
Those fans would be gone awhile, but they would not miss much. As the Twins worked out a 12 inning win to move on to face the Yankees, and complete the greatest comeback in club history, the Wild were busy with their picks and shovels. By the time the crowd exploded to celebrate the Twins victory, it was clear that the Wild were not going to have a good night.
They were sloppy with the puck, gave up multiple odd man rushes after the defensemen pinched at the wrong moment, and could not find any momentum in the offensive zone. Hearing the loudest cheer of the evening coach Todd Richards said he “had to look around a bit to see if he missed something on the ice.” He didn’t. A moment later, the PA announced the Twins victory across town, and the fans became jubilant. That jubilation translated to vocal support of the Wild, and the Wild repaid that support with more sloppy play.
In what seemed like a cruel twist to the happiest of happy sports worlds, the Wild went down 3-0, giving up three goals in the second period, all resulting from pure defensive bungling. If not for outstanding play from goalie Niklas Backstrom, the Wild may not have recovered.
But recover they did. In the third period, defenseman turned forward John Scott challenged Anheim’s George Parros to a fight. Parros answered, and Scott commenced a beating for story tellers to tell for decades. As is the case so many times in hockey, that fight changed the momentum of the game, and the Wild finally found their legs with just 17:24 remaining in the game. Mikko Koivu scored his first goal of the season four minutes later, Petr Sykora added his first in a Wild jersey six minutes later, and Eric Belanger finished the comeback five minutes after that.
Now, the hockey fans had some hockey to cheer about.
After listening to trash-talking forward Cal Clutterbuck tell him he has a top five biggest head in the NHL,” and that he “looked like Wisniewski bobble head night all night,” Anahiem’s James Wisniewski lost his cool in overtime and took a swipe at the Wild’s Kyle Brodziak, earning himself a minor roughing penalty, and giving the Wild the advantage they needed. On the ensuing power play, Andrew Brunette scored what has become his signature style of goal, down low and not pretty, a ended the greatest single game comeback in franchise history.
Asked about his first NHL victory as a head coach, Richards said, “It will be one I will always remember, [more] than maybe a 6-0, 7-0 win. The way that was accomplished, and the way the guys played in the third will be something that I will remember.”
Richards said, “For forty minutes we weren’t very good… but they certainly made up for it in the third.”
Asked what turned it around, Richards said, “It was a commitment from each guy to play a certain way. Each guy made a commitment to each other, to the team that they were going to play hard for one another.” Players credited John Scott’s fight with turning the game around. Eric Belanger said “That gave us a spark. That’s not an easy job. You don’t play much and then you have to come out and fight for your teammates. He deserves a lot of credit.”
Richards said, “Without a question it was the turning point of the game. It takes a lot of courage for guys to do that, and he did it. Clearly he got the crowd into it. We were going pretty good in the third, but it stirred up some more emotion on our bench. He didn’t get another shift after that, but I really think he was the difference in the game.”
The Wild now go on a five game, eleven day road trip across the west coast. They play Thursday in Los Angeles, Saturday in San Jose, and games next week in Anaheim, Edmonton, and Vancouver. How they fare on this road trip could have repercussions that last the rest of the season. If they play the way they did the first forty minutes of this game, it will be a long trip. If the team that showed up in the third plays the entire trip, it could be a happy team upon returning to Saint Paul.
Game Notes *Wild forward Martin Havlat had three assists in the game, bringing him to 400 points for his career.
* Andrew Brunette’s goal was his first ever regular season OT goal.
* The Wild are currently tied with the Washington Capitals for the longest streak of home opener wins, at 8.
* Pierre-Marc Bouchard was a late scratch with “recurring headaches.” The team said that they will seek “medical solutions to find out what’s wrong with him and get him healthy.”
The author can be reached at bryan.reynolds@prohockeynews.com
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