ST. PAUL — With a golden opportunity to get within two points of a playoff spot, the top line of Kirill Kaprizov, Joel Eriksson Ek and Matt Boldy carried the Minnesota Wild to a 10-7 comeback victory over the Vancouver Canucks inside Xcel Energy Center on Monday.
The trio combined for 16 points in the win between five-on-five and the power play, and the Wild now just sit two points behind the eighth-place Blues.
“It’s nuts,” Boldy said of the seven-goal third period. “I don’t think I’ve ever been a part of something like that where they just kept going in one after another.”
Both Kaprizov and Eriksson Ek scored a hat trick and had a career-high six-point performance. Only Marian Gaborik has recorded six points in a game in franchise history, and he did it twice.
Their linemate Matt Boldy had a goal and four points himself. The Wild have an opportunity to tie the Blues tomorrow with a win against the Jets in Winnipeg.
With the Wild's depth shaky as of late, the trio was once again the team’s best players, and they delivered when it mattered most. Five of the six goals from Kaprizov and Eriksson Ek came in the third period on Monday.
Simply put, they've been very effective in the five games since they were put together back on Feb. 9.
“We play well together,” Kaprizov said through a translator. “We mesh well and things go well. So, it’s a lot of fun.”
Entering the game, the line had controlled 63.3 percent of the expected goal share and outscored the opposition 13-6, according to MoneyPuck.com.
“Those guys are playing at a really high level, and that’s what you need this time of year,” coach John Hynes said of the trio of Kaprizov, Eriksson Ek and Boldy.
“When you look around the league, your players that play the top minutes and most important minutes, when those guys drive the team, not just in point production but the process to get the points. They’re fast. They’re physical. They’re also playing against top lines.
“They’re hard to contain. They are responsible defensively. The three of those guys are playing a hard-skilled game, and they’re trying to get rewarded for it. Now you watch those players play with that intensity and commitment, it feeds through the rest of the team.”
Eriksson Ek has a team-leading 28 goals this season after his hat trick, and he surpassed his previous career high goal total of 26 in the 2021-22 campaign.
"PK, power play, five-on-five, he always battling,” Kaprizov said of Eriksson Ek, who was awarded the the player of the game Viking helmet. “He's earned it.”
It's not surprising that Kaprizov (57 points), Eriksson Ek (51) and Boldy (44) are leading the team in scoring. If the Wild are going to make the playoffs, they are going to need their top line — as well as Mats Zuccarello who had four points Monday and is also up to 44 on the season — to keep playing like this.
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