*Photo from Bally Sports*
The Minnesota Wild got a little Bold in this one. Bad joke aside, Matt Boldy had a goal and an assist, Frederick Gaudreau added the game winning goal, and the Wild slipped past the Edmonton Oilers with a 2-1 victory on Monday night in St. Paul.
After dropping Friday's game against Edmonton, the Wild have won two straight. They've also gotten wins in 7 of their last 10 games and 8 of their last 11, increasing their record to 15-11-2 on the season. They were led by the youngster Boldy, who got his 6th multi point game of the season and the 15th of his NHL career.
Boldy kept it short, saying after the game that "It's a big win. They've got some super players over there. I think just how good our core played kind of just speaks to how good they are. It's impressive."
Kicking off the scoring in the first period was Boldy, who gave the Wild a 1-0 lead with a power play goal 12:36 into the game. The goal went down as his 11th on the season, with assists coming from Mats Zuccarello and Kirill Kaprizov.
Later in the first period, on a power play of their own, Zach Hyman found the back of the net for the Oilers, tying the game 1-1 with assists from Tyson Barrie and Connor McDavid. The only goal of the second came from Gaudreau, going down as the game winner with Boldy getting the assist, Gaudreau's 5th goal of the season.
Wild head coach Dean Evason said that "We were defending, and not only just playing defense. We were doing the right things offensively that we didn't have to play as much defense. We held onto pucks. We didn't blindly throw pucks through the neutral zone. We didn't blindly throw pucks into the slot when it wasn't there. When we do that, now they have a counter and a transition, and they can really hurt us. We liked our overall game."
Getting the start in goal for the Wild was Marc-Andre Fleury, who picked up the win, reaching double digits. Fleury improved to 10-7-1 with the win, saving 20 out of the 21 shots on goal from the Oilers, recording a .952 save percentage.
Drawing the start on the other end of the ice for the Oilers was Stuart Skinner. The loss dropped Skinner's record to 9-7-0 on the season. He posted a .933 save percentage, turning aside 28 of the 30 shots from Minnesota.
Edmonton head coach Jay Woodcroft said of the loss that "It came down to one 5-on-5 goal against that we feel we could have handled better. We certainly had enough time to get the equalizer, just couldn't find it tonight on a good goaltender and against a good team."
Up next, the Oilers play the second end of a back to back on Tuesday against the Nashville Predators, with Jack Campbell getting the start. The Wild play the Detroit Red Wings on Wednesday night, with Fleury expected to start.
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