Mikko Koivu scores tying, winning goals for Wild

SAN JOSE -- Mikko Koivu and Eric Staal each scored two goals, and the Minnesota Wild rallied for a 5-4 victory against the San Jose Sharks at SAP Center on Thursday.
The teams combined for six goals in the third period.
The Wild trailed 4-2 after Sharks forward Patrick Marleau scored at 4:21, but they scored three straight goals, the first by Staal and the next two by Koivu, who played his 800th NHL game.

WATCH: All Wild vs. Sharks highlights
Staal scored his second of the night on a tap-in at 5:06 to cut San Jose's lead to 4-3, and Minnesota tied it 4-4 at 8:23 when Koivu put a rebound past goaltender Martin Jones and inside the left post.
Koivu scored again at 10:18, this time on a slap shot from the right faceoff circle, to make it 5-4.
"When it's a one-goal game, there's a lot of time left," Koivu said. "You're just trying to get the pucks deep and create that forecheck and shoot it as much as we can. I thought we did that, and we got the extra one at the end."
Zach Parise also scored in the third period for the Wild (24-9-4), who played for the first time since their 12-game winning streak, the longest in their history, ended with a 4-2 loss to the Columbus Blue Jackets on Dec. 31.

Parise, Jason Zucker and Mikael Granlund each had two assists for Minnesota.
Joonas Donskoi, Joe Pavelski and Joel Ward also scored for the Sharks (23-14-2), who lost their third straight game.
"They seemed to get all the loose pucks," said Jones, who made 21 saves. "They were hungrier around the net than we were. It was a grind. Pucks were just bouncing around. We were really good for two periods. It's one of those things. They get a couple bounces, they get some momentum, and they really started buzzing there in the third."
San Jose took a 1-0 lead on Donskoi's fifth goal at 8:22 of the second period, and Pavelski made it 2-0 when he sent his own rebound past goalie Devan Dubnyk from close range at 11:27 for his 13th goal.

Staal cut the Sharks lead to 2-1 with a power-play goal with 1:01 left in the second. Parise dropped a pass to Staal, who beat Jones from the left point to the far side.
Parise scored at 2:08 of the third to tie it 2-2. Jones stopped Nino Niederreiter's sharp-angled shot from below the left faceoff circle but couldn't control the rebound, and Parise scored on a slap shot from the left circle.
San Jose answered with goals by linemates Ward (3:49) and Marleau to build a 4-2 lead. It was Marleau's 492nd NHL goal.
Dubnyk made 30 saves.

Goal of the game

Koivu took a pass from Granlund in the right faceoff circle and beat Jones with a slap shot for the game-winner. "It was a hard pass," Koivu said. "It has to be a hard pass to beat the goalie, and it was right on the tape."

Save of the game

The Sharks had an extra attacker on the ice when Pavelski snapped a shot through traffic, but Dubnyk made the save with 21 seconds remaining.

Unsung performance of the game

After earning a promotion from the third line to the top line with Parise and Staal at the beginning of the third period, Niederreiter had an assist and helped energize a line that scored two goals in the period.

Highlight of the game

Pavelski made two key plays before capping a great shift by scoring San Jose's second goal. He won a faceoff in the right circle, and then redirected defenseman Brent Burns' point shot on goal. Dubnyk made the save, but Pavelski lifted the rebound over the goaltender's right shoulder and into the net.

They said it

"We started to move our feet a little bit in the third. We started to play a little smarter at the offensive blue line. Got it below their [defensemen] and forced them into some turnovers. That's how we got a lot of pucks back, and that's how I think we got all of our goals, really."-- Wild forward Zach Parise
"They came out in the third and played well. I don't think we handled their pressure coming as well as we would have liked. Hopefully, we can learn from that. We just weren't breaking out as clean as we were in the first two periods. When they were in the zone, I don't think we were closing as fast as we should. We gave them too much time." -- Sharks defenseman Justin Braun

Need to know

Wild defenseman Jonas Brodin played his 300th NHL game. ... Sharks defenseman Marc-Edouard Vlasic (face) missed his third straight game, and defenseman David Schlemko (upper body) missed his second straight. ... San Jose forward Mikkel Boedker was a healthy scratch for the first time this season. ... Sharks rookie Timo Meier skated on the top line.

What's next

Wild: At the Los Angeles Kings on Saturday (4 p.m. ET; NHLN, FS-W, FS-N, FS-WI, NHL.TV)
Sharks: Host the Detroit Red Wings (10:30 p.m. ET; CSN-CA, FS-D+, NHL.TV)