Postgame Hat Trick: Wild 5, Devils 2

Wild.com's Dan Myers gives three takeaways from the Wild's 5-2 win against the New Jersey Devils at Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul on Thursday night:

1. Can't cool 'em off
Stay hot, Ryan Hartman. And stay hot, Kirill Kaprizov. These two are just unconscionably hot right now, and even that might be an understatement.
Kaprizov, the NHL's leader in points over the past few weeks, posted three more points on Thursday, scoring a beauty of a goal, a greasy one and assisting on another.

In typical Kaprizov fashion, he downplayed the goal itself.
"It just kinda happened" Kaprizov said through a translator. "I don't think I did anything special, I think I just kind of went around the defenseman and made a good play. I don't know where to rank it [on my list of pretty goals]."
It's a list that's getting longer by the day, and this one ranked right up there with some of the best.
Hartman had the primary assist on Kaprizov's gorgeous first-period tally and on Dmitry Kulikov's rebound salvo in the second period, arguably the two most defining goals of the game. To cap off his night, Hartman finished off the scoring with his 13th goal late in the third period, ending any hopes of late-game heroics.
The goal was Hartman's 10th shot on goal of the game, as he became just the fifth player in team history to reach double digit shots on goal in a game (Gaborik, Parise, Rolston and Zucker are the others).

"We just went out there played our game, tried to play hockey, try to create opportunities for each other and have fun," Kaprizov said. "It wasn't anything in particular that we did, just went out there and played."
Some added context: Kaprizov is riding a four-game point streak. Sounds modest enough, right? He's got 10 points during that four-game stretch, including a four-point game and a three-point game. And that doesn't even count the four-point night he had just before the point streak began.
Kaprizov is tied for second in the NHL with 24 even-strength points and his 28 points is tied for fifth-most.

Hartman is now on a five-game point streak, and he has eight points during that stretch. The multi-point night was the 24th of Hartman's career and fourth this season, as he's now posted back-to-back multi-point efforts for just the fourth time in his 388-game NHL career.
\blushing face emoji**
Hartman also had a bunch of close calls that could have made his great night even greater.

"There's definitely been games in my career ... Vegas in the playoffs, there's been times in my career getting a lot of chances like that," Hartman said. "But those grade-A types, I look at one, the one on the power play hit his thumb on top of the glove, like this hard thumb pad, otherwise it was going in. The other one that was backdoor hit his knob like two inches off the ice. It was just very lucky I guess.
"But I guess when a lot go in you're bound for a couple of those every once in a while."
Wild coach Dean Evason was quick to note that the offense hasn't come at the expense of other areas of ice.

"The looks they had were incredible," Evason said. "[Hartman's] obviously feeling it and the line was real good. They didn't cheat the game. They weren't staying on the offensive zone. They weren't staying on too long. They weren't cheating in the offensive zone. They didn't blow zones. They played the right way and they had a tremendous amount of looks obviously."
Those two perfectly encapsulate the Wild offense as a whole, which is clicking at a historic rate and has been for quite some time.
The Wild has scored four-plus goals in four straight games and in 13 of its 23 contests this season. Minnesota ranks tied for second in the NHL for most four-plus goal games, trailing only the Florida Panthers in that category, who did it for the 14th time on Thursday night against Buffalo.
2. Stack 'em high and watch 'em fly
Minnesota's offense has been the steam engine behind its now five-game winning streak that actually began eight days ago in New Jersey against these very same Devils.
"We're having a great time. But we're playing the right way and that's why it's happening," Hartman said. "We're playing underneath the puck. We're playing smart defensively. There's sometimes where we lose our high forward in the offensive zone and they go for rushes. They probably had a few too many odd man rushes tonight still but we've got Kaapo back there who saved us a lot.
"But overall the way we've been playing is how we want to play and we're getting off to leads which is a nice change."

With a tough stretch of games on the horizon, beginning Saturday night against the Toronto Maple Leafs, and a four-game western road trip on the docket after that, the Wild has done an outstanding job banking points during a span of games where it has been without its captain Jared Spurgeon, who missed a sixth consecutive game with a lower-body injury.
Good news on that front: Spurgeon seems like he's getting closer and closer to a potential return to the lineup, although when he could be back is still up in the air. The nice part is, with the team playing so well, there's no reason to rush the captain back.

"It's fun. We're feeling confident in the room," Kulikov said. "We know we can score goals, but we also know defensively we try to do the right thing. Our goalies have been making big stops for us. Cam and Kaapo have played really great."
The matchup against Toronto should be a fun one.
Minnesota's win on Thursday vaulted it to the top of the Western Conference standings ahead of Edmonton, while the red-hot Maple Leafs come to town having won 15 of their past 17 overall. Toronto sits with Florida tied atop the Eastern Conference.
"My mom already told me that it's Hockey Night In Canada," Evason said. "She watches every game. Believe me. Yeah it's exciting. They've got a good hockey club. We've got a good hockey club. It'll be a good game."
3. Rem's rolling
With the holiday season upon us, perhaps it might be time for the Wild to send a gift basket and a Christmas card the way of the Nashville Predators, who put Rem Pitlick on waivers a few days before the start of the regular season.
Their intention was to sneak the talented winger to their AHL affiliate in Milwaukee, but the Wild was having none of it.
And that's turned out to be a wise decision.

Pitlick has an impactful player for the Wild since being inserted into the lineup a few games into the season. After being healthy scratched the first five games, Pitlick made his season debut Oct. 26 in Vancouver and was immediately noticeable.
A bout with COVID-19 immediately followed, and that is the only thing that has been able to peel the former Golden Gopher from the lineup.
Since returning from the protocol list on Nov. 7, Pitlick has a point in seven of 13 games played and is up to 10 points in 14 games overall, putting him among the top rookie scorers in the league, despite the fact he's missed a handful of games. He's tallied eight points in his past 10 contests.
Is it too soon to hop aboard the Calder Trophy bandwagon?

Loose pucks

• Minnesota's 33 points through 23 games is the most in franchise history
• Kulikov has 11 points in 23 games this season after posting 14 points in his past two seasons combined (99 games)
• Mats Zuccarello returned to the lineup after missing the past two games with a hand injury. He assisted on Kaprizov's second goal, the 298th helper of his NHL career
• Kahkonen had an assist, the first point of his NHL career, and made 29 saves
• Ryan Graves and Tomas Tatar scored goals for New Jersey
• Devils goaltender Mackenzie Blackwood allowed all five goals on 38 shots

Dan's three stars

1. Ryan Hartman
   2. Kirill Kaprizov
   3. Rem Pitlick

Highlights