Wasn't pretty, but a win's a win for the Wild

The Wild won its first road game of the season Monday when it beat Calgary in a shootout, 2-1, at the Saddledome.

In a terrific performance, Niklas Backstrom made 23 saves through overtime, then two more in the shootout, as the Wild won its second consecutive game heading into Tuesday's 9 p.m. CT game at Vancouver.

Zach Parise scored his 31st career shootout goal, and Mikko Koivu in his 500th game, scored his 28th.

Kyle Brodziak scored his first goal of the season in the second period and Ryan Suter, who played an exceptional game with rookie Jonas Brodin, had an assist and plus-1. Devin Setoguchi had his fourth consecutive real good game, assisted on Brodziak's goal, was skating hard all nice and chipped a fake tooth when he was high-sticked by Jiri Hudler as a second-period power play expired.

Read the game story on www.startribune.com/wild, but not a pretty win. The game itself was ugly and the Wild also went spurts of 10, 8 and 12 minutes in the game without shots. Tons of turnovers.

Yet, still, the Wild did a good enough job away from the puck coach Mike Yeo opined because it only gave up 24 shots through OT.

Not a fun game to watch though by any means.

Backstrom has started five games in a row since Josh Harding was pulled 6:45 into the game against Chicago. But Yeo gave the clearly-off Harding a quick hook that night and it 100% got the Wild two points.

We will see in the morning.

Yeo didn't rule out a Jared Spurgeon return. If he returns, the Wild will have to make a roster move. The only obvious one would be sending Marco Scandella, scratched the past two games, back to the minors. He doesn't require waivers.

Spurgeon hasn't had a full practice though, so it may be too early for a return.