Wild Score 3 Unanswered in 2nd Period, Beat Islanders 6-3 – The Hockey Writers NHL News Latest News, Analysis & More

The Minnesota Wild and New York Islanders faced off for the first time this season on Saturday, Feb. 8, in St. Paul, Minnesota. The Wild’s roster remained the same as their win over the Carolina Hurricanes earlier in the week on Thursday, Feb. 6, until warm-ups started and it was revealed Joel Eriksson Ek would not be playing. The Islanders were without Mathew Barzal, Scott Mayfield, Ryan Pulock, Noah Dobson, and Mike Reilly, and two of their goaltenders are on injured reserve: Marcus Hogberg and Semyon Varlamov. 

Related: Wild’s Roster Depth Stepping Up Both Defensively & Offensively

Filip Gustavsson was in the net for the Wild, and for the Islanders, it was Ilya Sorokin. The game started in favor of the Wild, and the Islanders answered, but the Wild dug deep, scored three unanswered in the second, and took the 6-3 win. This moves the Wild to a record of 33-19-4 and the Islanders to 25-23-7. 

Game Recap

The Wild got on the board first for the second straight night as their top line got things going. Marco Rossi scored his 19th goal of the season as Matt Boldy and Jared Spurgeon assisted him to make it 1-0 early in the first. However, just 13 seconds later Kyle Palmieri answered for the Islanders to tie things up. Brock Nelson and Maxim Tsyplakov assisted him, and the score was tied at the end of the period. 

The second period started a little slow, but the Islanders got on the board first with a goal by Nelson, who was assisted by Tsyplakov and Palmieri and took their first lead of the game, 2-1. That gave them momentum to score once again with a goal by Anders Lee to take a two-goal lead, 3-1. Scott Perunovich assisted him. 

The scoreboard was quiet until the Wild’s Frédérick Gaudreau banked one off an Islanders player and scored on the power play to make it 3-2. That woke the Wild up, and they scored not once but twice with goals by Boldy, who Jonas Brodin and Spurgeon assisted. Yakov Trenin scored the second goal, and Jake Middleton and Marat Khusnutdinov assisted him in retaking the lead 4-3 and ended the period on a high note. 

They carried that into the third period as Boldy scored his second of the night, and this time, it went off an Islanders player to give his team a 5-3 lead. However, the Wild weren’t finished, as Marcus Foligno added an empty net goal later in the period to make it 6-3 unassisted. That would be the final goal of the night and the Wild would go into the break on a win.

The Wild and the Islanders will now be on break for the 4 Nations Faceoff. The Wild will return from break on the road to face the Detroit Red Wings on Saturday, Feb. 22. The Islanders will return home on Sunday, Feb. 23, to host the Dallas Stars.