Wild at a loss against Hawks

Chicago cruising while Minnesota looks for answers

So, that could have gone better.

Four days after arriving in Chicago to declare that they were ready to challenge the Blackhawks, the team that in consecutive years has ended their post-season, the Minnesota Wild return home down 0-2 and wondering what just happened at the United Center over the weekend.

“I don’t know what team played that game, but it wasn’t us,” said Wild coach Mike Yeo, after a lopsided Game 2 in which Chicago repeatedly pounced on Minnesota turnovers to win 4-1.

Where the Wild had been competitive in the series opener, storming back from an early three-goal hole to tie the game before losing by a 4-3 score, Sunday’s game had comparatively few bright spots for Minnesota. The ice didn’t open up and swallow them whole, at least, so there’s that.

“The first game had a different feel to it,” Yeo said. “[Sunday] was, like I said, this was not us. The good news is that this will be the last time we say [that] in this series.”

He had better hope that is true, because after two games everything is pointing Chicago’s way.

Before the series began, Blackhawks coach Joel Quenneville paid tribute to the Wild by assessing them as the most defensively disciplined team they had played. “They are probably as good a checking team as you are ever going to see,” he said. The coach, and his players, all talked about how the upand-down style Chicago liked to play would be stymied by the Wild’s ability to slow the game and clog up the middle of the ice. “There’s going to be a lot of dump and chase,” Blackhawks winger Bryan Bickell said, somewhat ruefully. Chicago would have to be careful to avoid getting frustrated and walking straight into a Wild counterpunch, he said.

But in Game 2, it was Minnesota that was burned by sloppy mistakes. On the power play in the second period, defenceman Ryan Suter failed to hold the puck at the blue line, and as he skated to retrieve it, Marian Hossa swept past him, controlling the puck and setting up Jonathan Toews for the go-ahead goal. Later in the period, Chicago’s Duncan Keith intercepted a Tomas Vanek pass and immediately fired it 90 feet up the ice to the stick of Patrick Kane, who snapped the puck past Devan Dubnyk. After the Wild had pulled to within a goal early in the third, the Hawks jumped on another turnover and Patrick Sharp beat Dubnyk to end thoughts of another comeback.

Suter said he didn’t think the Wild were guilty of making an inordinate number of mistakes, costly though they were.

“I don’t think we made more, I just the think the ones we made, the ones I made, they capitalized on,” he said. “They have guys who make you pay.”

That’s another problem for Minnesota: The Blackhawks’ stars are rolling. Kane scored twice in Game 2 and has seven points in his last five games, and 10 for the playoffs. Toews has nine points in eight games. Sharp has five points in his last three games. Keith has six points in three games and 10 for the playoffs. And Marian Hossa, though still without a goal, has seven playoff assists.

Yeo brushed off questions about the play of Chicago’s leaders — “I care about our team right now,” he said — and whether Minnesota’s stars needed to match that output to have a chance in the series. To that point, Zach Parise has nine points in eight games himself, and terrorized Hawks goalie Corey Crawford in the second period, but was unable to put a puck in the net.

And that’s the final big problem for the Wild: Crawford, who came into the series having been shelled, and benched, in the first round against Nashville, appears to have found his form. When Chicago had a one-goal lead on Sunday night, the Hawks goalie made a beautiful pad save on Kyle Brodziak as he was cutting in front of the net, and moments later stoned Parise multiple times from just outside the crease.

Dubnyk, the Vezina Trophy finalist who turned around Minnesota’s season when he arrived in a trade from Arizona in January, doesn’t wear much blame for the two-game losing streak, with the goals he allowed on Sunday all coming off turnovers and on odd-man rushes. But if the Wild are going to make a series of this, they can’t have Dubnyk and Crawford battling to a draw. They either need their guy to steal a game, or the other guy to give one away. Both outcomes remain possible.

In the post-Dubnyk era, the Wild had gone 47 consecutive games without losing two in a row in regulation. Until now. It is a big hill they face.

“We should be excited to play in front of our crowd,” said Yeo, “but we have to treat it like a Game 7 right now.”

That, they do.