The Minnesota Wild were able to dig themselves out of an early two-goal hole on Saturday, but they couldn’t overcome Nico Hischier’s three-goal night.
In a game with all of the bad blood normal for historical division rivals — an oddity for a team Minnesota sees just twice a year — the New Jersey Devils led early and never trailed, holding off the Wild in a 5-2 win.
Goals by Marcus Foligno and Ryan Hartman weren’t enough offense, as Minnesota lost for the third time in the past four games. Wild goalie Filip Gustavsson had 28 saves in the loss.
For New Jersey, which had been blanked in Winnipeg one night earlier, Hischier turned in his second hat trick of the season and goalie Jacob Markstrom had 22 saves, holding off several notable pushes by the Wild after the visitors established an early 2-0 lead.
Trailing 3-2 in the third, Minnesota had a late power play but could not find the equalizer. Then New Jersey got a power play and Hischier completed the hat trick, sending the Wild’s largest crowd of the season home disappointed.
The game’s opening 29 seconds featured odd-man rushes by both teams in both directions, and when the first whistle arrived, New Jersey led by a goal. Minnesota had gotten a 2-on-1 break off the opening faceoff but did not get a shot off. Then, with two Wild players caught in the offensive zone, the Devils stormed back the other way, with Gustavsson stopping a Jesper Bratt shot, but Hischier popped in the rebound.
Roughly five minutes later, the Devils doubled their lead on another odd-man rush when, again, Gustavsson made the initial save, only to have the rebound slip between his knees when fourth-liner Paul Cotter fired from low on the goal line.
But all was not lost in the first as the Wild got on the board late in the frame to cut the deficit in half. Jared Spurgeon’s shot from the high slot was deflected in front by Foligno, with the puck bouncing hard off the ice and fluttering over the goalie’s right shoulder. It was the 12th goal of the season for Foligno and his first since returning from a five-game absence due to injury.
Foligno was all over the score sheet on Saturday, taking an embellishment penalty that had the Wild bench offering choice words for the officials, and dropping the gloves for a second period tussle with Devils defenseman Johnathan Kovacevic after Foligno had hit another New Jersey blueliner into the end boards.
New Jersey maintained a 2-1 lead at the end of a scrappy second period, and were inches away from extending the advantage in the final seconds when Hischier’s shot toward a mostly open net glanced off the skate of his teammate, Timo Meier, and went wide of the crease.
Hischier finally got his second of the game and dampened the sellout crowd’s hopes of a comeback when his wrist shot from just inside the blue line glanced off Wild captain Jared Spurgeon’s shin pad and fluttered past Gustavsson’s glove, off the post and in. It was the fourth multi-goal game of the season for Hischier.
But the Wild again had an answer when Hartman poked a loose puck in the crease over the line after a Foligno deflection had hit the crossbar behind the Devils goalie. The Wild got a power play a short time later when former Gophers standout Erik Haula tripped up Yakov Trenin on a rush to the net, but Minnesota managed just one shot during the two minutes of man advantage.
Hischier and Tomas Tatar scored late for the Devils, who will be the home team when they face Minnesota again on Monday.
After playing 10 of their last 11 games at home, the Wild next embark on a three-game road trip to the New York City area, visiting the Devils first, then the New York Rangers on Wednesday and the New York Islanders on Friday before playing three of their last five regular season games at home.
