Wild use power play to defeat Penguins

ST. PAUL, Minn.-- The Minnesota Wild scored three power-play goals in a 6-2 win against the Pittsburgh Penguins at Xcel Energy Center on Friday.
Minnesota (11-7-2) went 3-for-4 on the power play and has scored six power-play goals in the past four games. Devan Dubnyk made 34 saves; he has allowed 15 goals in his past 12 games.

Wild defenseman Jonas Brodin made it 2-0 with a power-play goal at 8:09 of the first period. It is the second consecutive game Brodin scored on the power play. Minnesota forward Zach Parise scored a power-play goal at 15:12 of the second period to make it 4-1, and forward Nino Niederreiter tipped in a pass from Mikael Granlund at 11:25 of the third period for a third power-play goal and a 6-2 lead.
"We're shooting. Shooting the puck," Wild coach Bruce Boudreau said. "And Wild assistant] John [Anderson] works very hard at that. I keep telling him, just keep pounding it in them, pounding it in them to shoot it. And he does, he shows it every day, and when you shoot pucks, good things happen."
**WATCH: [Penguins vs. Wild highlights**
Wild forward Charlie Coyle scored 40 seconds into the first period to give Minnesota a 1-0 lead. He scored at 19:37 of the first for a 3-1 lead. Granlund made it 5-1 at 18:40 of the second.
"Going into the period, a couple goals ahead is a totally different story," Coyle said. "You know that team doesn't give up. We keep going the right way like we did, and like I said, doing the little things out there. Winning battles, board play, just getting pucks in the net and guys [creating] traffic, and sometimes we get a few like that."

Penguins forward Phil Kessel made it 2-1 at 13:26 of the first period. With his sixth goal (21st point) of the season, he became the fifth active United States-born player to reach 600 NHL points.
Pittsburgh forward Bryan Rust scored at 5:50 of the third period to make it 5-2. Marc-Andre Fleury made 30 saves for Pittsburgh (12-6-3).
"Early on we made some big mistakes," Penguins captain Sidney Crosby said. "You give up big scoring chances like that, it's tough to win games."

Goal of the game

Parise started the play from the neutral zone and passed to Eric Staal, who passed back to Parise in front for his fourth goal of the season.

Save of the game

Staal intercepted a pass in the Pittsburgh zone and attempted to tuck the puck past Fleury, but was denied when Fleury kept a toe against the post in the first period.

Unsung moment of the game

Brodin scored with a slap shot from inside the blue line, his sixth NHL power-play goal. Brodin has his first point streak after scoring in a 3-2 win against the Winnipeg Jets on Wednesday.

Highlight of the game

Granlund curled and dragged around Pittsburgh defenseman Ian Cole for his goal. Granlund has six points in the past three games.

They said it

"I thought we put him in a tough spot. The goals they got, they're Grade A scoring chances. The types of saves he had to make were high-quality. So I thought we put him in a tough spot in a lot of the circumstances." -- Penguins coach Mike Sullivan on goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury
"Nice to score more than two goals or three goals. That's a great win for us." -- Wild coach Bruce Boudreau
"It was good. I hope it's something we can improve on and keep working at. That's such a big part of the game for us. Again, when you can get one on the power play -- it's hard to score 5-on-5 -- so when you can get one on the power play, it's amazing what it does for the team and the guys as individuals." -- Wild forward Zach Parise on Minnesota's power play

Need to know

Wild defenseman Christian Folin left the game at 13:14 of the first period after a check from Crosby. The Wild said Folin has a sprained MCL in his left knee and will be out 3-4 weeks. Nate Prosser will replace Folin in the lineup Saturday. … Kessel has eight points in his past six games. … Coyle leads the Wild with seven goals. He has at least one point in three of the past four games.

What's next

Wild: At the St. Louis Blues on Saturday (8 p.m. ET; FS-MW, FS-N, FS-WI, NHL.TV)
Penguins: Host the New Jersey Devils on Saturday (7 p.m. ET; MSG+, ROOT, NHL.TV)