Wild show class after wrenching end to playoffs
SAINT PAUL, MN.
This was tough duty. Mikko Koivu, the Minnesota Wild captain, has maintained his class and grace throughout his career, even when critics held him up as the symbol whenever the Wild came up short.
He was summoned out of the team sanctuary to face the horde of media in the Wild dressing room after he helped the team rally from the darkness of a 3-1 deficit to tie Game 5 of their Stanley Cup Playoff series with St. Louis, only to lose 4-3 in overtime. And now he had to satisfy the media vultures who all seemed to want someone to admit they failed, to acknowledge they weren’t good enough. This, in the minutes after they had played an emotional battle that ended in frustration and disappointment, when Magnus Paajarvi caught a pass through congestion and snapped a quick shot past Devan Dubnyk at 9:42 of overtime.
To have physically and technically outplayed the spirited Blues in all five games, yet to have lost four of them, was wrenching. But Koivu stood tall and displayed no hostility or frustration at the shallowness of the questions, or the demands to offer reasons where none existed. It started with him being asked why the Wild came out “flat,” and got behind 2-0 in the first 10:31.
“We came out the way we came out in a lot of games,” Koivu began, then he adjusted, because the Wild had come back from 3-1 to get the 3-3 tie. “It doesn’t matter how we came out. It’s a long game, and we caught up and had a lot of momentum. Sometimes the other team plays good; they’re allowed to get momentum too.
“We played well, just not good enough. Somehow, they always managed to get one more goal.”
The gem of Koivu’s analysis was to point out what is always obvious but often overlooked by those who would be critics: The other team is allowed to participate in the game.
St. Louis star Vladimir Tarasenko was a force every game, yet when he scored at 7:16 of the first period in Game 5, it was his first goal of the series. Alexander Steen made it 2-0, as the Blues pinned the Wild in their own zone and outshot them 9-2 while gaining that 2-0 lead. The Wild got a power play, and defenseman Ryan Suter moved in from left point and whistled a blast past goalie Jake Allen — his first goal, too — to cut it to 2-1 by intermission.
The Wild outshot the Blues 15-7 in the second period, and while it was scoreless, they had three great chances to score. Jason Zucker broke in but Allen stopped him; Marco Scandella got a break-in chance, but Allen’s poke-check foiled him; and Eric Staal, the Wild’s top-line center, broke between and beyond two defenders and focused so much on his shot that he lost control of his balance and crashed headlong into the end boards. He appeared to be knocked out, and had to be helped to the dressing room and then a hospital.
Coach Bruce Boudreau calmly moved Erik Haula up from fourth line to first, centering Charlie Coyle and Nino Niederreiter. Again the Wild put pressure on in the third period, but Paul Stastny, who had been out for two weeks with an injury, went deep on the right side and when Devan Dubnyk stopped his try, he lifted a follow shot and got it to squeeze in for the Blues at 7:23, and it was 3-1. I thought then that the Wild might pack it in.
The Wild had a great chance a minute later, and Niederreiter went into the crease looking for a rebound. The puck had gone behind the net, and Martin Hanzel jammed it at the crease again. As the puck dropped between Allen’s feet, St. Louis’s Jori Lehtera cross-checked Niederreiter in the back, knocking him into Allen. The goaltender and the puck wound up in the net, but the official, who was behind the net on the far side, waved it off. The ruling was that Niederreiter interfered with Allen’s ability to make the save, which wasn’t true, because he dropped to his knees and the puck apparently squirted in before the contact. It took a long video review to uphold it, because the ref was neither in position to see the cross-check or to see the puck cross the line.
It was still 3-1 at 10:38 when Koivu, at the right of the crease when Niederreiter’s shot from the right boards was blocked by Allen, knocked in the rebound to cut it to 3-2.
Then came one of the great plays of the season. Haula caught a pass from Jonas Brodin on the left boards, and he lofted a soft pass between two defenders for Zucker to skate to. Zucker, who is quick, burst past the last man and toward the left side of the net. Closing fast, Allen knew Zucker would shoot, so he dropped to his knees, but Zucker brilliantly held the puck for one more stride, which carried him just past Allen and allowed his quick shot to tie the game at 14:59.
Tarasenko just missed on a wraparound, then Zach Parise and Coyle forechecked the Blues to a frazzle, forcing icing. And then it was overtime. The Wild, by then outshooting the Blues handily, came out full of momentum. But as Koivu apparently had to point out, the opposing team was very good and got its chance. Vladimir Sobotka spun away from a check in the right corner and went straight for the net, passing the puck through some congestion in front. Dubnyk followed the puck and dropped to his knees, but the puck bounced through, and Magnus Paajarvi flicked his wrists and the puck was in the net at 9:42. Sudden death was never more appropriately named.
Mike Yeo, fired by the Wild a year ago, took over the Blues at midseason and pulled them together for a stirring drive through the last three months to make the playoffs, but he claimed to revenge or glee from his foe. “This is not about me,” he said. “We have a goal to keep improving and advance in the playoffs, it was just a little bit of irony that we were playing the team I used to coach.
“They’re a class group. They have a lot of pride, a lot of character, and I knew they wouldn’t stop pushing,” Yeo added. I asked him if his ever-improving Blues were playing their best right now. “We play our best when we’re pushed, and, credit our opponents, there were a lot of points where it didn’t feel like we were playing our best. But everybody over there has to be proud. They’ve had an unbelievable year, and you could tell by the way they fought all the way through every game of this series.”
Wild coach Bruce Boudreau took the stand next. “I knew they were going to come out like that,” he said. “I also knew they couldn’t keep it up if we could just keep pushing.”
Possibly the chippiest guy in the media group asked Boudreau if the outcome meant the Blues were the better team, because they won four out of five. “They weren’t the better team, but they won four games,” Boudreau responded, a comment used repeatedly, as though Boudreau had tossed it out, and without the context of him reacting to a shallow question. Asked why the Wild couldn’t score more, the way they did in regular season, he shot back: “We got about 40 shots a game; their goalie was obviously pretty good.”
Those who want to shoot down the Wild for losing to the “lowly” Blue, consider that while the Wild won the most games in their history (49), accumulated the most points in their history (106), and scored the most goals in their history (263), they finished 49-25-8. The Blues were 46-29-7, including 22-8-2 since Yeo took over Feb. 2. If you counted the series in with the regular season, the Wild would be 50-29-7, and the Blues 50-30-7. Pretty even.
I asked Boudreau if the amazing closeness of virtually every game among the 16 teams in the first round meant anyone could win the Cup now. “Every team is capable,” Boudreau said, “but usually the best team will win.”
Boudreau said after the game, “I told the players I was proud of their effort, the whole year. They never quit, and when things were going bad, they still never quit. It’s a tough business. It’s tough to win. That’s why only a certain amount of teams have won in the last 20 years.”
