Winnipeg wins another round in its on-going battle with Wild

Alongside the normal postgame announcements encouraging fans to check around their seats for misplaced items, and to drive safely on the way home from the rink, the Xcel Energy Center public address announcer would have been wise to offer this disclaimer about the hot and getting hotter rivalry between the Minnesota Wild and Winnipeg Jets: To be continued ...

ADVERTISEMENT Winnipeg rallied for a 4-1 win on Monday night in a wildly entertaining sprint to the final horn between the top two teams in the Western Conference and featuring arguably the worlds best goalie right now.

Jets puck-stopper Connor Hellebuyck was the story, as he denied all but one of the Wilds 44 shots on goal, and solidified his credentials as the driving force behind Winnipegs ascension to the top of the NHL standings.

These Central Division foes will have one more border battle a few days before Christmas in Winnipeg, and they seem predestined to meet again in the spring when the NHL playoffs roll around.

On Monday the Wild took an early lead on defenseman Jake Middletons fourth goal of the season, and they got 30 saves of their own from Filip Gustavsson.

But the advantage was short-lived, as Winnipeg forged a tie, killed penalties and stopped rush after rush by Minnesota, taking the lead in the second period and locking things down for the final 20 minutes.

We came out flying.

We threw the kitchen sink at him, ...

and its disappointing.

But theres positives we can take from it, Middleton said.

Former Minnesota Duluth standout Alex Iafallo scored his 99th and 100th career goals for the Jets, icing things with a power-play marker in the late stages of the third.

Hellebuyck, who is from suburban Detroit and was named college hockeys best goalie after his 2013-14 season at Massachusetts-Lowell, made his NHL debut nearly nine years ago to the day with a win over the Wild in Minnesota, and has continued that habit throughout his career.

Mondays game marked his fifth straight victory over the Wild, as Winnipeg opened up a six-point lead in the Central Division standings.

Its always tight games against these guys, I feel like, Wild forward Marcus Johansson said.

And you know, we wanted to get the upper hand tonight and show that we can play with everyone.

But I mean, even though we did show that, we didnt get the two points.

We didnt get the win, and thats frustrating.

ADVERTISEMENT Both goalies were tested early and often, with the Wild opening the scoring when Jake Middleton fired home the rebound of a Johansson shot.

Winnipeg answered a short time later when Iafallo backhanded a puck past Gustavsson.

The Wild recorded 22 shots in the first, which was one shy of the team record, set in 2018, also versus Winnipeg.

I think the shot guy fell asleep on the button.

Minnesota, they throw a lot of pucks to the net front.

I mean, we went and looked at our scoring chances, and it certainly didnt reflect what all of the shots that were coming, Jets coach Scott Arniel said.

But they are a team that likes to throw pucks there, with bodies around there.

I thought we did do a really good job there of finding a lot of the rebounds and kind of clearing them out.

The shots, and Hellebuycks saves, kept coming in the second, as the Winnipeg goalie held Minnesota off the board and former Wild forward Nino Neiderreiter popped a backhander over Gustavssons left shoulder to give the Jets their first lead.

Then the Wild offense cooled, and they needed more than seven minutes in the third to test Hellebuyck again.

The Wild managed just five shots in the third period, as Adam Lowry added an empty-net goal with 63 seconds remaining.

I think we gotta take some things out of it.

I think theres more good than bad out of the game, but you gotta take lessons out of everything, Wild coach John Hynes said.

Each game is an opportunity to test yourself in different situations.

I thought we did lots of good things.

Theres some things we can grow from the game.

We got a lot of hockey this week, too, so we gotta put this one behind us.

Perhaps the best news of the night for Wild fans came before the game ever started, when scoring star Kirill Kaprizov returned to the lineup following a one-game absence.

ADVERTISEMENT Injured by a nasty knee-on-knee hit in Minnesotas 5-3 win in Edmonton last Thursday, Kaprizov missed the Wilds 4-3 shootout loss in Calgary two days later, but no serious injury was found when he was evaluated by team doctors upon returning from the road trip.

Forward Marat Khusnutdinov, also injured in Edmonton, missed his second consecutive game and has been classified as day-to-day with a lower body ailment.

Wild forward Jakub Lauko left Mondays game early with a lower body injury as well.

Hynes said he did not immediately know Laukos status for their Wednesday game in Buffalo, but noted that reserve forward Travis Boyd is available if needed.

Following the one-game road trip to face the Buffalo Sabres, the Wild have back-to-back home games with Chicago on Friday and Nashville on Saturday.

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