Wild Downed By Flyers In Shootout

The Minnesota Wild is still searching for its first preseason win of 2010, but it did find the energy it was looking for. The Wild dropped a 3-2 decision in a shootout to the Philadelphia Flyers on Saturday, but the team can come away feeling much better about its game.

Tempers were flaring much of the night, due mostly in part to some shenanigans by Philly's Danny Carcillo and Zac Rinaldo. They instigated a slew of extracarricular activities by running players, including Rinaldo's hit on Andrew Brunette well away from the play.

The Wild built two one-goal leads, the first coming when Casey Wellman opened the scoring with a first period power play goal. But Philly tied it 18 seconds later when Nikolai Zherdev finished off a two-on-one.

The score remained tied into the third period when Chuck Kobasew rammed home a Brunette centering feed for a 2-1 lead. Once again, the Flyers answered shortly thereafter.

Both teams had power plays in overtime, but nobody could score. Zherdev finally ended the game with the only goal of the shootout.

• Niklas Backstrom played all three periods and overtime, and stopped 18 of 20 shots faced.
• Matt Kassian was involved in his second fight in as many nights, this time beating the stuffing out of Matt Walker.
• Several young roster hopefuls had impressive nights, including Wellman, Nate Prosser (one assist) and Chad Rau. Drew Bagnall also showed some toughness and a willingness to jump to the defense of his teammates. He went right after Rinaldo following the Brunette hit.
• The Wild immediately left St. Paul for Montreal with the third game in as many nights tomorrow night. Included on that roster are: Forwards - Cullen, Kobasew, Staubitz, Gillies, Miettinen, Brodziak, Clutterbuck, Almond, Kalus, Earl, DiSalvatore, Peters, Latendresse. Defense - Zidlicky, Stoner, Scandella, Barker, Noreau, Falk, Bagnall. Goalies - Anton Khudobin will start with Matt Hackett as the backup.