Wild’s Kaprizov Hero in 3-2 OT Win Over Canucks

The Minnesota Wild and Vancouver Canucks had their first of three meetings on Tuesday evening, Dec. 3 at the Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul, Minnesota. The Wild announced earlier that day that they placed Jakub Lauko and Jonas Brodin on injured reserve while Mats Zuccarello went on retroactive long-term injured reserve. They also made the decision to recall Liam Öhgren and Jesper Wallstedt, but neither was on the roster against the Canucks, and neither was new addition David Jiříček.

Related: David Jiříček Brings Size & Youth to Wild Defensive Core

The Canucks posted on social media before the game that Filip Hronek underwent a successful lower-body procedure and won’t need surgery for an upper-body issue. He’ll still need to miss eight weeks due to the procedure. The two goaltenders for the night were Filip Gustavsson for the Wild and Kevin Lankinen for the Canucks. Despite a back and forth efforts, the Wild took the win 3-2 in overtime on a Kirill Kaprizov goal, and that moved the Wild to 17-4-4 and the Canucks to 13-7-4.

Game Recap

The first period started slowly but gained speed and intensity as time went on. The Wild had some great chances early for their top line but couldn’t get past Lankinen. The Canucks captain, Quinn Hughes, who’s been racking up points, capitalized on a power play and gave his team a 1-0 lead off a pass by Elias Pettersson. The Wild were unable to find an answer, and the Canucks ended the period with the lead. 

The scoring took some time in the second, but it was by the Wild to tie the game 1-1. Frédérick Gaudreau scored his fifth goal of the year off of a pass by Marcus Foligno to get their team back in the game. The Canucks didn’t let the Wild have the lead for long, however, as Jake DeBrusk knocked home a loose puck with under a minute to play in the second to give his team the lead once again. 

The Wild answered back early in the third on a strong shot by Jake Middleton, unassisted, to tie the game 2-2 with plenty of time left for either team to take control. However, neither team could find the net, and it went to overtime to determine a winner. It looked like it would go to a shootout, but with 23.4 seconds left, Marco Rossi set up Kaprizov for the game-winner. 

The Wild won’t have any game action until Friday, Dec. 6, when they head west for their California road trip to face the Anaheim Ducks and Los Angeles Kings back-to-back, and after, they’ll take a quick trip up to Utah for their first matchup. The Canucks, on the other hand, will head back home to face the Columbus Blue Jackets also on Friday.