Wild postgame: An 'off night' all around

There really isn't much more to say about the Wild's 4-0 stinker against Los Angeles on Wednesday. It does seem interesting in retrospect that coach Mike Yeo seemed so nervous about the game when he spoke after the Wild's morning skate. He promised the game would be neither easy nor fun if the Wild didn't mind the details, which were sorely lacking in a sorry performance.

Goaltender Darcy Kuemper didn't have any real explanation for his poor play. He never looked right, which was magnified as he constantly faced odd-man rushes during the one period he played. Kuemper gave up four goals on 10 shots, including one that trickled through his pads, and sat glumly on the end of the bench for the final 40 minutes as Nicklas Backstrom finished up.

"It was an off night for myself," said Kuemper, who had gone 3-1-0 with a 1.60 GAA and .949 save percentage in his previous four games."I was off a little bit tonight, and it cost me.

"I felt good this morning, I felt good in warmups. It was just one of those nights where it doesn't really go your way. It happens. You've just got to get over it."

Yeo said he considered pulling Kuemper after the second goal, scored by Dustin Brown on a two-on-one. Brown had winger Justin Williams open on his right, but he chose to hold the puck and shoot. That was the one that dribbled through Kuemper's pads.

"I thought about (pulling Kuemper after that goal)," Yeo said. "I regret not doing that now. Even the third goal (scored at 18:18 by Tyler Toffoli), I thought, 'Well, there's a minute-thirty (left in the period), let's give (Niklas Backstrom) a chance to have a bit of a stretch between periods.' I thought we could get through that.

"The list of regrets I have now is very long. But at some point, you have to battle through that stuff, too."

The Wild outshot the Kings 28-22, but goalie Martin Jones was strong--despite having played in a shootout loss the night before--and his teammates supported him well. The Wild frequently turned the puck over in the neutral zone, and the Kings were all over them in the offensive zone. At one point in the third, Nino Niederreiter--who led the Wild with six shots on goal--got the puck at close range with a good look at the net. The Kings' Trevor Lewis swooped in and lifted Niederreiter's stick to spoil one of the Wild's best chances.

The Wild also missed the net 18 times, were outhit 23-16, whiffed on some good opportunities and were sloppy with their passing.

Yeo said the Wild's performance was "not even close to the way we're supposed to play the game ... We actually came out with some good energy, but execution, details killed us." He added that he wished he would have "done some different things to try to alter our focus and our mindset before coming into this game," but he declined to elaborate. While Yeo thought the Wild played better later in the game, he said, "I'm not going to try to get any moral victories out of that."

The Kings were delighted to end a streak of road futility that had begun to play on their minds. They had won once in nine road games before Wednesday.

"This is important, not just for the two points in the standings, but for our psyche," Williams said. "It was big getting the lead. Mentally, we were exactly where we needed to be. (The Wild) played us hard in LA (in a 2-1 Kings victory in October). We wanted to show them what we're all about."