ST. PAUL, Minn. _ After a 7-2 thrashing on the road this past Saturday, the less-than-stellar-on-the-road Wild at least had this comfortable home game to use as a rebound.
That sort of worked out, as the Wild extended their streak of earning a point in 13 of their past 14 games at Xcel Energy Center with a 3-2 overtime loss to the Calgary Flames on Tuesday in front of an announced 19,011 fans.
"You look at their home record, they have a great home record. If you turn the puck over, they're going to capitalize," Calgary winger Garnet Hathaway said pregame. "(It's) about puck management. It's about staying committed to the process and get the puck on net. We'll keep getting chances, and they'll go in."
Calgary (22-16-4) is now on a four-game winning streak while the Wild (22-17-4) take a bit of a skid into the second game of a back-to-back Wednesday at the Chicago Blackhawks. Entering the game, Chicago and Calgary were a point behind the Wild in a close race for a wild-card slot.
At the 6-minute mark of the first period, winger Michael Ferland scored for Calgary with assists from center Sean Monahan and winger Johnny Gaudreau. On a 3-on-2 that scrambled the Wild all out of position, Ferland just had to bundle the puck into an open net.
That same line seemed to have the Wild all figured out, as it scored again with 50.1 seconds to go in the second period. This time Monahan netted the tap-in score after a great pass from Ferland on a play Gaudreau manifested.
Winger Mikael Granlund snagged a goal back for the Wild at 7:16 in the third period with a pretty sweet shot. Defenseman Jared Spurgeon then clanked a goal off the post at 12:13 to make it a tie game.
But Calgary defenseman Dougie Hamilton netter the winner at 2:39 in the extra period.
To be fair, the Wild did have to reshuffle a bit with a lower-body injury to Nino Niederreiter announced pregame. Its second and third lines switched up, with Mikko Koivu centering Jason Zucker and Joel Eriksson Ek and Charlie Coyle centering Chris Stewart and Granlund. But after Calgary's first score, last year's scoring line of Zucker, Koivu and Granlund reunited and had some dangerous chances.
Koivu, who missed Monday's practice with the flu, also disappeared from the bench for most of the first half of the second period. He reappeared around the 10-minute mark and continued to play.
The Wild beat Calgary, 4-2, on the road back on Oct. 21 and managed a shootout victory at home on Dec. 12. Calgary coach Glen Gulutzan said pregame he actually liked how his team started in that most recent game despite the result and was expecting a similarly tight contest.
"We're bracing for that same type of game," he said. "We know there's not going to be a ton of chances, and so we have to make good on the ones we get."
Despite his team's past success against Calgary, Wild coach Bruce Boudreau said before the game he knew this result wasn't going to be a sure thing.
"They're a tough. Look, they beat us three times last year. We win by one goal in overtime this year," Boudreau said. "They're a tough team, and when they play the best they can play, they can beat anybody in the league. I mean, Anaheim I thought was a really good team (that Calgary beat 3-2 this past Saturday). But they're healthy, and they took it to them pretty good. It seems like when they're on top of their game, they win."
