Wild outburst creates comeback win against Ducks

ST. PAUL, Minn. -- The Minnesota Wild scored three goals in a 1:59 span of the third period for a 5-3 win against the Anaheim Ducks at Xcel Energy Center on Saturday.
Anaheim (26-14-9) led 3-2 with 6:21 remaining. Erik Haula scored for the Wild at 13:39, followed by Ryan Suter at 14:15 and Jason Zucker at 15:38.

WATCH: All Ducks vs. Wild highlights
"I think we just kept pulling; it's hard to say when, but we could feel it at the end of the second there that we were turning around a little bit," Haula said. "That's a good team over there and they played hard and we're happy the way we came back."
Minnesota (30-10-5) is 19-2-1 in its past 22 games and leads the Western Conference with 65 points. The Wild are 11-2-0 in the past 13 home games and 16-5-0 here this season. This is the third time this month Minnesota has rallied from a two-goal deficit to win (San Jose 5-4; Chicago 3-2; Anaheim 5-3).
"I don't know. … I think a lot of guys are confident that they can do it over and over again," Wild coach Bruce Boudreau said. "Certainly we wouldn't like to do it all the time. You like to be able to think that you can do it when you have to."

Devan Dubnyk made 26 saves. He is 16-2-0 with 39 goals allowed in his past 18 starts.
The Ducks have two regulation losses in their past 11 games (8-2-1); each one is to the Wild and former coach Boudreau. The other was 2-1 in Anaheim on Jan. 8.
Haula gave Minnesota a 1-0 lead with a slap shot at 2:35 of the first period. Stefan Noesen tied it at 5:47, and Ducks defenseman Cam Fowler scored on a shorthanded breakaway at 13:58 for a 2-1 lead.
It was Fowler's 10th goal of the season, tying his NHL high set as a 19-year-old rookie in 2010-11.
Corey Perry made it 3-1 with a power-play goal at 2:23 of the second period. It was the first non-empty-net goal for Perry since Dec. 13 at the Dallas Stars.

"It's unfortunate," Fowler said. "We come in, we put ourselves in a really good position to win a hockey game against a great team that plays well at home. To kind of, I don't want to say that we threw it away, but we certainly didn't make things easy on ourselves with some of the mistakes in the third period."
Zucker brought Minnesota within 3-2, getting a loose puck and beating defenseman Sami Vatanen to score at 5:03. It was Zucker's fourth goal in six games, and he has 13 points (seven goals, six assists) in the past 14 games.
The Ducks were 8-1-1 in their prior 10 games and had a point in 13 of 14 games (9-1-4).
"I would just categorize it as the goals that we gave were gifts," Ducks coach Randy Carlyle said. "They didn't have to really work as we did for ours in my estimation. We were guilty of giving up possession of the puck in the two [goals] that I can think of. … To me, that's gift hockey."
Anaheim's John Gibson made four saves before leaving at 14:22 of the first period with an upper-body injury. Jonathan Bernier made 16 saves in relief.

Goal of the game

Suter was positioned on the left side for a shot off a weird angle that deflected off Bernier for the go-ahead goal.

Save of the game

Gibson blocked a backhander by Zach Parise at 6:58 of the first period.

Unsung performance of the game

Wild defenseman Marco Scandella hustled back at 5:58 of the first period to prevent Ducks forward Andrew Cogliano from scoring on a wide-open shot to keep the score 1-1.

Highlight of the game

Haula scored his second goal on a deflection in the slot off Suter's shot.

They said it

"That was fun. It was loud, the crowd was into it. It was a lot of fun. It was a good ending to a great day for Minnesota." -- Wild defenseman Ryan Suter
"They're a good team. They're very deep, their whole lineup, when you have a guy like Parise on the third line, [it] means a lot. I think we were a little tired in the third, we were missing a few guys and it showed." -- Ducks goaltender Jonathan Bernier

Need to know

The Wild recalled forward Kurtis Gabriel from Iowa of the American Hockey League before the game. Gabriel had one five-minute fighting penalty in 4:37 of ice time. He played in place of center Tyler Graovac, who was a healthy scratch.

What's next

Wild: Host the Nashville Predators on Sunday (8 p.m. ET; FS-N+, FS-WI, FS-TN, NHL.TV)
Ducks: At the Winnipeg Jets on Monday (8 p.m. ET; TSN3, KCOP-13, NHL.TV)