Gaudreau, Wild defeat Stars in OT

DALLAS --Frederick Gaudreau scored 1:40 into overtime to give the Minnesota Wild a 3-2 win against the Dallas Stars at American Airlines Center on Thursday.

Gaudreau took a stretch pass from Marc-Andre Fleury, faked a slap shot and cut around Jason Robertson before shooting blocker side on Scott Wedgewood.
"I saw him out of the corner of my eye, he was still sitting back a bit," Fleury said. "I guess it was the French sense. I just tried to go around their forechecker, they were coming in pretty hard. But [Gaudreau] made an awesome play to get that goal."
Kevin Fiala had two goals and an assist, and Fleury made 34 saves for the Wild (46-21-6), who are 12-1-2 in their past 15 games and remained tied with the St. Louis Blues for second in the Central Division.
"We liked how it was that playoff type of hockey game," Minnesota coach Dean Evason said. "We just played hard, played right. We're happy with the group."

Robertson scored twice, and Roope Hintz had two assists for the Stars (42-27-5), who are 3-1-2 in their past six. Wedgewood made 24 saves.
"We'll take a point where we can get it," Robertson said. "This time of the year, you'd rather one point than zero points, but we still have to keep going and we have an important one Saturday (against the San Jose Sharks)."
The Stars moved into a tie for the first wild card from the Western Conference with the Nashville Predators, who lost 4-0 to the Edmonton Oilers on Thursday.
"We outplayed them all three periods, we just didn't put enough pucks behind them," Dallas coach Rick Bowness said. "We had goal posts, we had open nets, we didn't get the puck in. That's hockey. I'm very happy with the way we played. We just beat Tampa (1-0 on Tuesday), we just tied Minnesota and we lost in overtime, two of the best teams in the league. We keep playing like that, things are going to be OK."
Fiala gave Minnesota a 1-0 lead 2:14 into the first period when he received a centering pass from Gaudreau, settled the puck onto his backhand, and scored past Wedgewood as the goalie was moving in the opposite direction.
Robertson tied it 1-1 at 6:02 of the second, scoring off his own rebound from the edge of the crease on the power play.
Fiala scored shorthanded at 11:36 to put the Wild back in front 2-1. After Alexander Radulov turned the puck over at his own blue line, Fiala took another pass from Gaudreau, split the defense and scored on a breakaway.
It was his first shorthanded goal in the NHL.
"It was my goal to be a complete player," Fiala said. "Now playing PK, very grateful to get the chance and I feel very comfortable in that position. Just great to do something else for the team, to be defensively and kill penalties is very big."

Robertson scored 55 seconds into the third period when his shot from inside the blue line trickled through the five-hole of Fleury to tie it 2-2.
"I think that's two playoff type games that in a regular season that's the closest you're going to get, so I think we've rose to the occasion when we've met these games, and that's great," Stars forward Tyler Seguin said. "I don't think that as a team or as individuals we can really just flip a switch going into playoffs. You've got to be playing playoff hockey going in there, that's why sometimes you see the lesser seeds come out and have upsets. It's cause they're playing these games, you know, fighting for our lives, so that's [a] positive."
NOTE:The Wild have scored 266 goals this season, the most in their history.