Devan Dubnyk’s fantastic start to the season continued Tuesday night as he stood tall in net to lead the Wild (2-2-2) to a 2-1 win over the visiting Arizona Coyotes.
Winning the second leg of a back-to-back after traveling is never easy in the NHL, but the Wild pulled it off thanks to Dubnyk’s 31 saves and the ability to overcome adversity.
Minnesota was forced to play with a lack of depth at forward as they lost Mikko Koivu 30 minutes before the game started when he got word that his wife was going into labor, and Matt Hendricks went down with an apparent knee or ankle injury early in the first period and didn’t return.
It left the Wild with just nine forwards, forcing them to dress Nate Prosser and move Mikael Granlund to center for the first time in two years.
“A big part of our success in the past has been the depth of our group and different people stepping up when we need them to,” said Dubnyk. “We certainly have the guys in here that if we lose a couple we can continue to go.”
The game was tied 1-1 until Eric Staal’s second goal of the season gave Minnesota a 2-1 lead with just under 14 minutes to play in the third period.
“We have a lot of experience in this room so we know how to make games lie that happen,” Dubnyk continued. “We know if we hang in there and stay tight we are going to get a goal and we did that. It was nice to hang on to one. Obviously we have had a couple late blown leads. It’s good to get that feeling of winning at the end.”
It’s unclear how serious Hendricks’ injury is but head coach Bruce Boudreau indicated that it doesn’t sound like it’s too bad.
The Wild get two days off before playing a divisional game at Dallas on Friday.
