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Kirill Kaprizov bests Connor McDavid, leads Wild to big win over Oilers

dane mizutani, pioneer press
·3 min read

Kirill Kaprizov made himself very clear over the weekend. Asked if he likes playing against some of the other superstars in the league, Kaprizov responded in the affirmative before replying, “It’s even better to win against them.”

That’s no easy task against Oilers superstars Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl.

On Thursday night at Xcel Energy Center, though, Kaprizov proved he was up to the challenge. He scored a goal and added a pair of assists to lead the Wild to a 5-3 win over the Oilers. He also stretched his career-long point streak to 10 games in the process.

“I just tried to play my game,” Kaprizov said in English postgame. “That’s it.”

Though playing against a couple of superstars served as extra motivation, Kaprizov’s teammates said they didn’t notice anything different about his approach.

“I don’t think he needs to play against the best players in the league,” Marc-Andre Fleury said. “Every night he shows up for us. He has so much control of the puck and he’s so quick. He obviously played a great game.”

So did the Wild. They defended very well from the initial drop of the puck to contain McDavid and Draisaitl.

“If we were going to have success tonight, we had to play defense first,” coach Dean Evason said. “We’re not run-and-gunning. We’re not outscoring, uh, two players. They obviously have a lot more talent than that. We were really committed to looking after our end, and certainly early we did that.”

Still, the Oilers struck first as Draisaitl wired a shot into the back of the net on the power play to make it 1-0 midway through the first period.

That score held into the second period when Kaprizov finally created a scoring chance with a shot in front and Joel Eriksson Ek cleaned up the trash to tie the game at 1-1. That marked nine straight games with an assist for Kaprizov as he broke a franchise record set by Jim Dowd in 2002.

It wasn’t long before the Oilers’ dynamic duo struck again, as McDavid potted a feed from Draisaitl on an odd-man rush to make it 2-1. Frankly, the ease with which McDavid and Draisaitl connected was borderline unfair.

Luckily for the Wild, they have a superstar of their own in Kaprizov, and he rose to the occasion once again. After accepting a pass from Matt Boldy on the power play, Kaprizov leveled the score at 2-2 with an impressive effort.

“A good pass,” Kaprizov said in English. “I was in front of the net and I just shoot.”

That goal interrupted a “Skol” chant started by Vikings players Adam Thielen, Brian O’Neill, Garrett Bradbury and Blake Proehl, who were shown on the videoboard.

Not long after that, Freddy Gaudreau did his best Kaprizov impression, showcasing his silky mitts and scoring a pretty goal to make it 3-2 in favor of the Wild.

The separation goal came early in the third period as Sam Steel finished off a perfect pass to stretch the Wild lead to 4-2. Mats Zuccarello added a goal for good measure to make it 5-2.

That was more than enough for Fleury, who finished with 18 saves, including an incredible denial on the doorstep with the game hanging in the balance. He allowed a cheap goal in the waning seconds to finalize the score at 5-3.

As for Kaprizov?

“It’s the same work ethic every single night with this guy,” Evason said. “He’s playing every night like that, so he’s going to hit the wall a few times. We understand that. He drives himself and wants to lead the team by his work ethic, and he does that every night.”

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