Miserable Meltdown Means Minnesota Wild in Trouble

The days of moral victories are over.

There are no more shootouts, no more loser points for making it to overtime, and frankly, no more time.

But when your season could be over in 3 games, all of that goes out the window. The Wild needed to take advantage of a 2 goal lead.

Holding on to a lead here would have put the Minnesota Wild up 1-0 in the series. A 1-0 lead means that the series may already be over. 68.6% of the teams that win in Game 1 go on to win the series. And for a road team like the Minnesota Wild? That means that all you have to do is win out at home to secure a victory in the series.

So, where do the Wild go from here? They have another game tomorrow, and a win then does a lot of things that a win would have done last night: It still takes a road game from the Avs and allows the Wild to merely win out at home. It still makes it so the Wild obtain at least one victory before the return of Duchene.

It's time to move on, though. Game 2 is tomorrow night, and the Wild are still 4 wins away from winning their first playoff series since 2003. The game was close, exciting, and intense, suggesting a long series, There's still plenty to look forward to.

But man, there's going to be no way the Wild can possibly lose this series, and not have everyone invested in this team dwelling on the Game 1 they gave away. Being able to point to bright spots in defeat will be irrelevant. If the Wild wish to advance to Round 2, they will have to capitalize on opportunities and translate them into actual victories.