Cullen has no complaints about Xcel opener

There was a reasonably large delegation of family and friends in attendance when home- stater Matt Cullen made his official home debut for the Wild on Thursday night.

"Yeah, I had quite a few people here, but I actually thought there would be more," he said. "It's hunting season, I guess."

Among those unable to attend was Terry Cullen, his father and hockey mentor. Where was the guy who put Matt on skates three decades ago?

"He was hunting in New Mexico," Matt said. "Elk. He went O-fer. He chased elk all over New Mexico but didn't get one."

His son wasn't close to O-fer in the home opener at Xcel Energy Center. He didn't have to spend much time on the power play chasing the puck. It was on his stick on the point to do this damage:

• Edmonton was leading 2-1 and the Wild was 20 seconds into its third power play of the night. Cullen had the puck on the right and moved toward the faceoff circle. He saw Mikko Koivu making space for himself near the far post.

Cullen delivered a bullet on Koivu's stick and Mikko popped in the tying goal at 14 minutes, 31 seconds of the second.

• Kurtis Foster, the former Wild defenseman, was called for his second penalty in a row at 7:33 of the third. Koivu won the draw, the puck went to Cullen up front, and he buried it past Nikolai Khabibulin for a 4-2 lead that ended the scoring.

It was Wild's third power play of the night. It was Cullen's second goal for the Wild. And it was also the Wild's first victory after a pair of losses to Carolina last week in Helsinki, Finland.

Someone asked Cullen if the Wild entered this game with a feeling of "desperation" to get a victory. That seemed over the top, considering this was Game 3 of 82, but it wasn't for Cullen.

"I would say, yes, we were desperate," Cullen said. "We know how important it is for us to get off to a good start."

Cullen was in Ottawa last season, but he's heard enough about the 3-9 start from which the 2009-10 Wild never recovered, and he saw all those empty seats for three home exhibitions last months, enough to understand there's pressure to win games and keep the large crowds coming to St. Paul.

"It was a lot better than I thought it was going to be," said Cullen, who went so far as to call the atmosphere "electric" for his first home game.

Cullen will turn 34 on Nov. 2. He came to prominence playing at Moorhead High for his father and with his brother Mark. He went to St. Cloud State for two strong seasons, and was with Anaheim the next season (1997-98).

The centerman spent four-plus seasons with the Ducks, went to Florida for 1 1/2 seasons and landed with Carolina in 2005, after the lockout.

Peter Laviolette was the coach who started putting him on the point for the power play.

"There was a change in rules and teams were looking for a little more firepower," Cullen said. "He put me on the first power play shift and that didn't change."

So far, Wild coach Todd Richards has been using Cullen on the point with the first power play unit, and often sliding him to center to work with linemate Martin Havlat on the second unit.

This was Richards' review of the veteran center's effort Thursday: "There were a number of times from the bench, you were like, 'Oh, geez, who had that opportunity or who made that play?' And a lot of times you looked at '7' [Cullen] as the one making the play or had the opportunity."