Coyotes explode for five goals to batter Wild
This time, the Arizona Coyotes had an answer for another hot start from the visiting Minnesota Wild. They scored five unanswered goals in the second and third periods for a 5-2 win Saturday night at Gila River Arena.
Tyler Pitlick recorded his first two-goal game as a Coyote. Lawson Crouse got his first goal of the season and Jakob Chychrun tied the game at 2 in the second period, and the Coyotes kept the momentum for third period goals from Conor Garland and the two from Pitlick.
“For the most part, I really liked our second and third (periods). In the neutral zone we pressured them a little bit more. We didn’t back off, which was
nice,” Coyotes head coach Rick Tocchet said.
On Friday, Minnesota scored the game’s first four goals and cruised to a 5-1 win. Things looked bleak for the Coyotes on Saturday after the first period, as they trailed 2-0.
Crouse got the comeback started. He’d hit the goal posts several times in previous games but had yet to score a goal before he finally found the net early in the second. He was there to put away a rebound of Garland’s shot that Wild goalie Cam Talbot saved.
“That took a lot longer than I would have hoped, and I think that’s probably the longest I’ve been without a goal since I was a little kid,” Crouse said. “I don’t wish that on anyone, but when it’s not going your way you have to stick with it.”
Chychrun, the Coyotes’ highest scoring defenseman, scored when his shot from the point went off the body of a fallen Wild defender and into the net.
Garland gave the Coyotes the lead for good at 3:57 of the third, his eighth goal of the season, and Pitlick deflected Niklas Hjlamarsson’s shot past Talbot minutes later for his fourth. Pitlick finished off the Wild with an empty net goal with 47 seconds to go.
Hjalmarsson, Derick Brassard and Clayton Keller had two assists each, Garland added an assist, and goaltender Darcy Kuemper had 32 saves in his first game since Feb. 24.
Kuemper got some help from the goal posts. The Wild hit them three times with shots that didn’t go into the net.
“We stuck with it. We dug deep and we kept going. We kept going north and just doing the simple things,” Pitlick said. “When you do that then the plays start to come. When you play the right way good things happen.”
Matt Dumba tapped in a loose puck under Kuemper’s pads amid heavy activity in front of the net to open the scoring.
It took just 52 seconds to make it 2-0 for the Wild (13-8-1). Jordan Greenway skated up the ice alone, with teammates screening off Coyotes defenders. Greenway’s shot got past Kuemper for his second goal in as many days.
The Coyotes turned things around in the second period, and had all the momentum going into the third.
The Coyotes made some lineup changes for Saturday’s game. Forward Frederik Gauthier was called up from the taxi squad for his Coyotes debut and played on the fourth line with John Hayden, who was active after being scratched the past four games.
Defenseman Jason Demers, scratched for seven straight games, was back in the lineup and started the game. Ilya Lyubushkin was scratched for just the second time this season and first time since Feb. 18.