Recap: Wild 5, Capitals 3

ST. PAUL, Minn. -- Marcus Johansson scored twice for the Minnesota Wild in a 5-3 win against the Washington Capitals at Xcel Energy Center on Tuesday.

Joel Eriksson Ek and Marcus Foligno each had a goal and an assist for the Wild (21-21-5), who have won three in a row and four of their past five (4-1-0). Filip Gustavsson made 30 saves.

“I really liked the mindset that we came home with coming off the road, and the style of game that we need to be able to play,” Minnesota coach John Hynes said. “And just the consistency of it was important for us to be able to get to that game tonight, and I thought we did a pretty good job of it.”

Anthony Mantha scored twice, and T.J. Oshie also scored for the Capitals (22-17-6), who have lost two straight. Darcy Kuemper made 25 saves.

“We certainly can help ourselves and try to start [with] or get the first goal,” Washington coach Spencer Carbery said. “We've talked about that all year. It's really important to us, [a] low-scoring team and a team that doesn't score a bunch 5-on-5, that puts us in a really difficult spot right out of the gate.”

Brock Faber gave the Wild a 1-0 lead at 1:37 of the first period on a backdoor rebound off a Mats Zuccarello shot.

Foligno extended it to 2-0 at 4:42, scoring into the open net off a Matt Boldy shot that was high and wide.

“I think everyone kept staking around and I was kind of alone, and I just thought, ‘I have time,’” Foligno said. “I don’t think ‘Kuemps’ really saw it. I think too much traffic in front of him, and he’s kind of looking at Boldy, like maybe it was up in the air or something. And I was able to drop it, and it did stick a little bit; it didn’t go in. I was able to whack in to get it in before it crossed the goal line.”

Johansson pushed it to 3-0 at 6:28 of the second period after moving the puck through the neutral zone and scoring on a wrist shot from the left face-off dot.

Mantha cut it to 3-1 at 10:00 with a tip-in off an Evgeny Kuznetsov pass.

Eriksson Ek made it 4-1 at 1:37 of the third period on a partial breakaway with a wrist shot from the slot. It was his 20th goal of the season.

“I think we’re not giving the other team too many easy chances,” Eriksson Ek said. “I think the games before that we maybe gave up a little bit too much. … Now they have to work for it more, so it’s just a more solid game for us right now.”

Johansson extended it to 5-1 at 13:39, scoring with a snap shot from the right circle after Kuemper made a toe save on Pat Maroon down low.

Oshie cut it to 5-2 at 17:03 on the power play, tipping in a John Carlson shot from the blue line for his sixth goal in his past six games.

Mantha scored on a backhand at 18:24 for the 5-3 final.

“It’s hard chasing,” Mantha said. “That’s not what you want. I think we knew we had to step up today [and] unfortunately we didn’t really do it. The good news is we get 20 hours and we’re back at it. Tomorrow’s a big test again (at the Colorado Avalanche) and we need to be ready.”

NOTES: Capitals defenseman Rasmus Sandin was minus-1 with one shot on goal in 17:29 of ice time in his return after missing eight games with an upper-body injury. …Eriksson Ek (five goals, five assists) and Faber (two goals, five assists) each extended his point streak to five games. … Eriksson Ek became the ninth player in Wild history to record three consecutive 20-goal seasons.