Both the Minnesota Wild and Vegas Golden Knights were on the second half of back-to-backs when they met in St. Paul, Minnesota, on Sunday evening, Nov. 16. It was the first match-up of the season, and both teams were coming off wins the previous night. The Wild took down the Anaheim Ducks 2-0 and the Golden Knights beat the St. Louis Blues 4-1.
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As far as injuries, the Wild’s Nico Sturm, Zach Bogosian, Marco Rossi, and Vladimir Tarasenko were all still out. The Golden Knights were without Alex Pietrangelo, Adin Hill, Mark Stone, and William Karlsson. Filip Gustavsson was in the net for the Wild while Carl Lindbom was in for the Golden Knights. The game started out with the Wild taking the lead, only for the Golden Knights to fight back and force overtime. The Wild came out with the 3-2 win thanks to a power play goal. This moved the Wild’s record to 9-7-4 and the Golden Knights to 8-4-6.
Game Recap
The Wild got on the board first with a goal from Joel Eriksson Ek early in the opening period to make it 1-0. He was assisted by Mats Zuccarello and Marcus Johansson. The Golden Knights answered back late in the period with a goal on the power play by Pavel Dorofeyev. He was assisted by Mitch Marner and Tomas Hertl to make it 1-1. That was the final goal of the period, and they took the tie into the second.
The Wild got the jump first in the second as well with a goal by Yakov Trenin, his first of the season. He was assisted by Danila Yurov and Marcus Foligno to make it 2-1. That was the only goal of the period, and the Wild took the lead into the third period.
The Golden Knights got the first goal of the third period, their second power play goal of the game to tie it 2-2. It was scored by Reilly Smith and he was assisted by Shea Theodore and Ivan Barbashev. That was the only goal of the third and overtime was required to finish the game.
The Golden Knights held control for most of the ovetime until a holding penalty sent them to the penalty box with less than 30 seconds to go. The Wild scored their lone power play goal of the game to take the win 3-2. The goal was scored by Kirill Kaprizov and he was assisted by Zuccarello and Matt Boldy.
The Wild have one more game left in this homestand on Wednesday night, Nov. 19, against the Carolina Hurricanes. The Golden Knights will head home to host the New York Rangers on Tuesday, Nov. 18.
