Wild Can't Hang On To Lead In Loss To Blues

The end of preseason is getting closer, and while the Minnesota Wild dropped a 4-3 decision to the St. Louis Blues on Tuesday night at Xcel Energy Center, and disappointed Head Coach Mike Yeo in the process, there were enough bright spots to get fans ready for that home opener on October 8.

First and foremost was the continued success of Mikko Koivu's line, which set up the first goal of the game, a Marek Zidlicky power play marker that came two minutes into the game. Dany Heatley and Devin Setoguchi registered assists on that goal, and duplicated the effort later in the period to set up Mikko Koivu's tie-breaking goal late in the first.

In the second, surprise roster candidate Brett Bulmer padded the Wild lead, finishing off a rush after a centering feed from Guillaume Latendresse. It was the first-ever goal in an NHL uniform for Bulmer, a second round pick in last year's NHL Entry Draft.

That would be the end of the scoring for the Wild as the Blues came back with three unanswered, including Carlo Colaiacovo's game-winner with 1:09 to play. Niklas Backstrom took the loss in goal, stopping 22 of 26 shots, but several of his stops were spectacular, including a sliding pad save on Alex Steen at the end of the second period.

The Wild will have one more off day on Wednesday before wrapping up the preseason with back-to-back games in Columbus on Thursday and at home against Edmonton on Friday.