Wild tries to brush off dejection, rebound in Game 2 vs. St. Louis

In 12 years covering the Wild, I've seen goalies steal games out from under the Wild, but not to Wednesday night's degree.

Wild outshot St. Louis 52-26
Wild outchanced St. Louis, subjectively, 21-6.
Wild outfaceoffed (new word) St. Louis 59 percent to 41.
Wild outhit St. Louis 35-18, as Bruce Boudreau said to me after the presser today, "in our building! When have we ever had more than 20 hits in this building?"

Yet, the Wild lost because Jake Allen picked up where he left off in the regular season by making a career-high 51 saves and because the Wild's lack of execution in and around the net (Mikael Granlund blowing an open net, Charlie Coyle snapping his stick in half on a golden chance in overtime, Zach Parise inadvertently stopping a Nino Niederreiter goal, etc, etc, etc.).

So down at the arena today, the Wild held a very light practice and mostly rested and recovered in an attempt to bring the same type of game into Game 2, only this time maybe get an early goal on Allen, put some doubt into the Blues, gain some confidence on the Wild side and cruise to a win.

Friday's game is big.

Down 1-0 in a series, it you win Game 2, teams have gone on to win 52.1 percent of the time, 55.2 percent if the Game 2 was at home.

Take a 2-0 series lead, teams have gone on to win 87.3 percent of the time, 89.2 percent if that Game 2 win was on the road.

Wild fell down 2-0 in 2014 to Colorado and rallied back to win, but the first two losses were on the road, not at home.

So, Friday is pivotal.

"I don't think you can be frustrated," said Eric Staal. "I think you've got to come back to work and play a similar game. I felt like we had a lot of looks, a lot of opportunities out front that seemed to just be bouncing his way last night. We've got to play the same game. We've got to make sure that we're aggressive on the attack. If we attack the net and get there into those dirty areas we're going to get a couple bounces and get some more goals for sure."

What can the Wild do better?

Said coach Bruce Boudreau, "They did a tremendous job of blocking out and not letting us get those second chances. That's two games in a row they've done that to us, so it's a pretty good template for them. But if we want to have success, we have to find ways to get in there."

Christian Folin had a tough game, but Boudreau didn't sound like he plans to play Nate Prosser or recall Gustav Olofsson or Mike Reilly.

"I think we have to play him more to get him more involved," Boudreau said of Folin, who logged 11 minutes in the 78-minute hockey game. "When he plays more he's a better player."

Boudreau and assistant coach Scott Stevens loved Marco Scandella's game. He was a horse, especially with Ryan Suter in the box twice and Folin once.

"I thought Scandella was the best player on the ice last night," Boudreau said. "And [Matt] Dumba played 29 minutes. With them, it's fine. I thought Brods (Jonas Brodin) and Fols looked a little bit nervous. The first goal they scored off of one draw. That's a standard play by us. That should be an easy play but I think we panicked a little bit."
On Coyle's blown scoring chance in overtime, Boudreau said, "He was snakebit for sure. I don't know if there's anything he can do different. I guess the only thing we would say is bear down more.
We've seen it happen before. When you get into those shooting areas, just bear down and try to put it right through the goalie or right through the net. … That's unfortunate [he broke his stick] because I think that was an empty-netter."

Said Coyle, "We outplayed them, but we didn't outscore them, so that's what it comes down to. Like you said, we execute on some of those chances and it's a different story. But like I said, when we play that way, I think when this is all said and done, we're gonna be in a good place."

On the Wild's third pair, Suter said, "I thought everybody played well. Everybody makes mistakes. It's a game of mistakes. Obviously you want to limit your mistakes. I thought they did fine. If [Boudreau] thinks that, then maybe we'll have to come back a little bit harder and focus a little bit more defensively to help the young guys out."

Suter was asked what it was like to be in the box in OT, he said, "Oh man, that was awful. At the time, you feel you have to take that penalty. But when you're in the box – my uncle told me when he used to play and he was in the box, he would always keep his fingers crossed under his gloves. I tried that yesterday and it worked. It's not a good feeling. You feel helpless. Hopefully we don't have to experience that anymore."

Blues captain Alex Pietrangelo also took an overtime slashing penalty after Suter slashed him. He said, "Not a good feeling. I'll tell you that; not a good feeling, especially after we had the opportunity on the power play to try and finish them there. But it's why we have a good penalty kill."

From the Blues' room, they know they got away with one.

"I think we just need to put a complete effort in a little bit better," Allen said. "They took it to us for most of the game in an honest look at it. We just need to get a bit more speed into our game. … We're definitely going to be better next game. We've got a lot more to give."

"They've been one of the best offensive teams in the league all year," the goalie said. "They have four offensive lines. Theyre going to come at us the same way tomorrow night. We know that. We're going to have to be on our toes, and that's the way they play. We're going to expect the exact same thing or more."

Added Pietrangelo, "I think we'll be the first to admit we can play better. We'll have a discussion in here about what we can change in terms of limiting their shots. Fifty shots is a lot to give up, I know. It went into overtime, but they seemed like they wanted to be aggressive. We can be more aggressive as well."

On stealing a win, the defenseman said, "You're going to need to win those games. I feel like we've been on the wrong side of those a lot throughout the years. Jake was unbelievable; I think everybody knows that. Get away with a win there. I thought we played well through spurts. I feel like we need to be better."

Added David Perron, "I don't know how much better they can get but that was a pretty solid game by them. We know we need to make adjustments and get better.

"Once we scored that first goal, I felt like we maybe kind of backed off a little bit and they're good at protecting the puck, so they got a lot of shots on us."