In St Paul, the Minnesota Wild almost let a game slip away.
The Wild held a 4-1 lead heading into the third period and watched as the Ottawa Senators rallied to tie, 4-4.
Bust Eric Staal stopped the rally with a third period goal of his own to give the Wild a 5-4 lead.
“They play an interesting style of game. We got lured into it a little bit,” Staal said. “They were up the ice every rush and we kind of let them come at us. [We had a] good shift to get momentum back before we went out and scored. That was big to turn it back in our favor. We gutted it out and got the job done. That’s all you’re after.”
Eric Fehr added an empty goal to help the Wild snap a two-game skid.
Staal and Matt Dumbahad two goals apiece in the win.
Jordan Greenway also scored in the win as the Wild improved to 13-7-2.
Devan Dubnyk got the start for Minnesota but was pulled in the third period after the Senators rallied to tie the game; he made 22 saves.
“I’ve never made that change in my life, and I don’t want to make that change,” Wild head coach Bruce Boudreau said. “But I thought we needed a break and we needed something without calling a timeout, so you make the change and the change was long enough that I think it gave our guys a chance to calm down a little bit.”
Alex Stalock came in in relief and made one save for the win.
Thomas Chabot, Christian Jaros and Colin White were part of the rally for the Sens to them even in the third period.
The Senators dropped to 9-10-3 with loss.
“It just kind of feels like a waste,” Senators forward Chris Tierney said. “You work that hard to get back and to give it up a couple minutes later is a sour feeling. You take a lot away; a lot of good hard work we did, but obviously we don’t want to put it on ourselves to have to come back every game and score in the third. So yeah, it was a good effort, but in the end we gave them too much of a lead.”
Tierneyhad a goal in the second period for Ottawa.
[WATCH: All Senators vs. Wild highlights]
Craig Anderson made 28 saves in the loss.
“We had a major push. We tied the game. What’s been hurting us is still hurting us; it’s the way we defend and just easy coverage in front of the net,” Senators head coach Guy Boucher said. “Again today, we showed that we can score goals, but we also showed that we’re far away from having a defensive awareness and everything that we need to do defensively to be able to win games on a regular basis.”
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