Wild tries to end goal-scoring drought

For all the schemes and plans, after all the film review and adjustments, figuring out how to beat the Dallas Stars comes down to this:

Scoring. Particularly at even strength. While falling behind the Stars 2-0 in its first-round, best-of-seven series, the Wild has scored one goal. It came in Saturday's 2-1 loss in Dallas on Marco Scandella's power-play slapshot from the left point.

Other than that it's been a whole lot of nothing.

"I liked our adjustments going in," coach John Torchetti said of Saturday's game. "But we have to find a way to get 5-on-5 going. It's got to be a greasy goal, there's no doubt about that. We still got five or six guys that have to play a harder game.''

The Wild competed better and got scoring opportunities Saturday, especially Mikael Granlund, who had a game-high seven shots.

But there were still too many shots from the point that didn't get through, and not enough traffic in front of the net in search of rebounds. It wasn't until the final seconds of the game that Stars goaltender Kari Lehtonen was truly challenged.

The Wild is hoping a return home will be a catalyst. Of course, it struggled at home much of the season. The team's 21 home wins were the second-fewest among the 16 playoff teams, and the Wild lost its last three home games.

But none of that matters if the team can't find a way to score.

"We got better in Game 2, but we've still got to improve a little bit more,'' center Mikko Koivu said. "We've got to play our best. It's the biggest game of the year, and we recognize that. But coming home, we're excited about that.''

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Even-strength scoring becomes even more important considering that the Wild is 1-for-23 on the power play the past eight games and that winning draws has been a problem.

And in each game of the series the Wild has started slowly, being outshot 28-9 in the first period.

To Torchetti one key is finding the player with a better chance of getting a puck through traffic and on the net.

"They do a good job of getting in the lanes, they have three layers to it, and we have to do a better job of finding a stick and moving off our D shots," Torchetti said. "And getting a second rebound off a stick deflection.''

Bottom line is the Wild has to be grittier. Koivu and Jason Pominville each has one goal in his past 13 games. Charlie Coyle hasn't scored in the 20 games since getting two against Colorado on March 1. Jason Zucker has scored once in 17 games.