The Minnesota Wild played well enough to win in Toronto on Thursday night but a pair of goals by Auston Matthews handed Minnesota a 3-1 loss.
The Wild started strong defensively, holding the Maple Leafs without a shot for the first 9:04 of the game. But despite the return of Mats Zuccarello from an upper-body injury, Minnesota couldn’t get anything going offensively.
That kept the game scoreless until the second period when Matt Boldy fed Freddy Gaudreau for his sixth goal of the season to put the Wild on the board.
Boldy to Gaudreau cracks the code!
1-0 #mnwild pic.twitter.com/nIUyoEjHob
— FanDuel Sports Network North (@FanDuelSN_NOR) February 25, 2022
The Wild’s lead was short-lived however thanks to Matthews. The Toronto center scored his 35th goal of the year 27 seconds after Minnesota took the lead and sent both teams into the locker room tied at 1.
Although Kaapo Kahkonen played well enough to get the win with 22 saves on 24 shots, he gave up the game-winner on a redirect from Mitch Marner off of Matthews’ stick with 10:56 to play. Toronto added a late goal from Alexander Kerfoot and handed the Wild their fourth loss in the past five games.
Minnesota (31-15-3) will look to break out of their slide when they finish a four-game Canadian road trip when they face the Calgary Flames on Sunday night.
