'You gifted them a goal': One mistake costs the Wild a chance at two points

ST. PAUL - So much of the game is played within two zones and both are on the ends of the ice. You're either in your defensive zone or in the offensive zone, that's where almost all of the game is played. Yet the neutral zone is considered the most important.

It certainly was tonight. 

The Carolina Hurricanes are one of the best forechecking teams in the league. They have a roster full of forechecking machines like Jesper Fast, Jack Drury, Stefan Noesen, Jordan Martinook, and Jordan Staal. 

To follow up on that, they have one of, if not the best defensive cores in the NHL. It's tough to get past all six of their defensemen. The Hurricanes play the exact style in which they force their opponents to play and they beat them at it. 

Dump the puck, go to work along the boards, and repeat. This is where the neutral zone can and is, the most important. It's where plays develop and where plays die. Many teams may opt for a 1-2-2 neutral zone forecheck but the Hurricanes are on you quickly and force dump in's or mistakes.

On the Hurricanes' game-tying goal with 21 seconds left in the second period, Andrei Svechnikov was late on the back check coming out of the offensive zone. Seth Jarvis and Staal both attacked Kirill Kaprizov who was coming out of the defensive zone with speed and forced a turnover. 

Kaprizov intended to hit Matt Boldy with a pass after he had two Hurricanes sweaters right in his face but the puck deflected off a stick and went to the boards where Declan Chisholm went to play it. Kaprizov went off for a change and Chisholm fired the puck straight into the back of Boldy, instead of into the offensive zone, which sparked a 3-on-2 the other way for the Hurricanes. 

"I thought particularly in the second period we controlled the play and didn't give much up. But it’s the little details of things. It’s the end of a long shift," Wild head coach John Hynes said on the failed dump in. "We get to that area of the ice. Those are must-make plays that gotta go in."

Marcus Johansson hoped over the boards after Kaprizov went off and could not catch up to Svechnikov before he ripped home his 13th of the season. Kaprizov's decision to come off for a change was the result of him thinking Chisholm got the puck deep. 

Which he didn't. 

"Um. Late in the second there," Chisholm said on where the game slipped away. "The puck doesn't get deep and then they come back and score a late one."

A failed dump in led to a 3-on-2 the other way and the Hurricanes made no mistake.

"You lose a one-goal game and you gave them, … you gifted them one goal," Hynes said. "I think when you're playing good teams, and you’re coming down the stretch and you're fighting to get in, lots of times those are things in the game where you got to execute at key times."

Later in the third period, Jarvis went into the boards with Marco Rossi and fell on top of Rossi's knee bending it awkwardly. Rossi was given a tripping penalty but could not serve it due to his injury. Rossi went to the locker room so Mats Zuccarello served the, so called penalty. 

With time expiring on the power play, Drury fired a shot that went off Noesen's face and squeaked in for a power-play goal. This turned out to be the game-winning goal. 

“Yeah, it was a bad bounce, for sure. But it we’ve got to keep working here," Jonas Brodin said on the fluke goal. "Don’t get too down when we lose, just come back tomorrow and work hard, and then we look forward to Nashville here.”

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