The Wild pinch out the Blackhawks

Beaten by three, the Wild still burn on

Lost, and still lit

The Minnesota Wild lost their own game on qualification night by three goals, and their flame never went out. This was a virtual match: each team played its own game, and the one that scored more went through. Across the shelf stood the Chicago Blackhawks, 31st of 32 last season and gone dark on qualification night in both 2023-24 and 2024-25. For Chicago, losing meant one more early exit.

Four on the power play

In St. Paul, the Columbus Blue Jackets led 2-0 before Matt Boldy's power-play wrister at 6:18 of the second. Kirill Kaprizov snapped home another on the man advantage 2:06 later. Then Columbus pulled away. Kirill Marchenko scored a hat trick and Elvis Merzlikins stopped 48 of 52. Still, Zeev Buium's power-play snap shot and Kaprizov's power-play tip-in in the third got the Wild to four goals. Every one of them came with the man advantage.

Chicago stalls at two

At the United Center, the Blackhawks twice pulled level with the Montréal Canadiens, first on Sam Rinzel's wrister and then on Connor Bedard's power-play tip-in. Neither team scored again until the final seconds. Louis Crevier picked up an instigator penalty and a 10-minute misconduct for fighting Kaiden Guhle, and Guhle beat Spencer Knight with 0:15 left. With two goals, Chicago could not catch Minnesota's four. The Blackhawks went cold, and 21 flames burn on.