Minnesota heads for wild Wild finish
By John Gilbert
If the Minnesota Wild make the playoffs, they won’t have a game with higher intensity or drama than their 2-1 victory over the defending Stanley Cup champion Los Angeles Kings on Tuesday at Xcel Energy Center in Saint Paul.
A capacity crowd at the X stood and cheered through the final minutes, as Niklas Backstrom and the Wild strained every nerve in the building to hold off the attacking Kings. The Wild got goals from Charlie Coyle and Cal Clutterbuck 13 seconds apart in the first period, and held on against a curious stretch in the second period. Play got particularly intense, with a nasty climax when Dustin Brown KO’d Jason Pomerville of the Wild with a perfectly thrown elbow.
Pomerville caught the flagrant elbow right on the chin, and went down on his back, smacking the back of his helmeted head on the ice. Pomerville got up, stumbled to the bench, and then the dressing room, and didn’t return. Brown didn’t even get a minor penalty, but the play is sure to be reviewed by the NHL, who, if they want to stress cutting down on blows to the head, will have no choice but to hit Brown with a suspension.
The Wild went into the game locked with Columbus at 51 points, in a tie for the final two playoff spots in the West. They played with full intensity for all 60 minutes, and any wavering would have cost them the game. Coach Mike Yeo made a couple of moves, promoting hard-hitting Clutterbuck to the second line, with Matt Cullen and Devin Setoguchi. Coming on right behind the Mikko Koivu-Zach Parise-Charlie Coyle line, that proved to be a 1-2 punch when first Parise went deep on the left and fired a pass out front that Coyle put away, then Clutterbuck, a right-handed shot, dashed in on the left and fired a bullseye into the upper left corner for the 2-0 start.
The finish came down to Backstrom hurling himself across the crease to make the save of the game with 12 seconds left, and the Wild gained two extremely important points. The Wild moved up to 53 points, two up on Columbus, and three up on Detroit. The Kings, hoping to move up from fourth, stayed at 57 points and had to travel to Detroit for a huge game Wednesday night, knowing that St. Louis was only one point behind them, and San Jose two points back.
Without a doubt, the Wild game against the Kings was just like the best playoff game you could see, and suddenly the Friday game against Edmonton doesn’t look so imposing. A Wild victory in that one will clinch a playoff spot.
CRITICS RISE
If a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, how scary is no knowledge? If you read the columnists or listen to the talk-radio guys in the Twin Cities the last couple of weeks, you’d think the Wild is in collapse mode. The Wild went on an impressive tear a month ago, and charged into the midst of the Western Conference’s eight-team playoff picture. That included a victory in Vancouver that I thought might have been the best game I’ve ever watched the Wild play. The next game was in Detroit, and the Wild played at least as well to also beat the Red Wings. That victory over the Red Wings could prove pivotal as the teams head into their final weekend of play, their final two games.
Two weeks ago, the Wild struggled in three home games, against Chicago, St. Louis, and Columbus — three of the league’s best — then went on their last road trip and won convincingly in Calgary and Edmonton, before heading for San Jose where the Sharks feasted. Those media folks who don’t go to hockey games unless their continued absence would embarrass them, ripped the Wild for not doing better in San Jose. One talk-radio guy got his cohort to agree that it was ridiculous to play ace goaltender Niklas Backstrom at both Calgary and Edmonton, where they were assured of winning, because the load might be too taxing for Backstrom
That’s like saying with a half-dozen games to go, the Twins should rest Joe Mauer, or with two weeks to go, the Vikings should sit-out Adrian Peterson. At the risk of submitting a couple of facts serving as evidence, there are no easy games, no sure things, at this stage of the season, and especially a season condensed into a frantic pace by the lockout that eliminated the first half of the season. You play Backstrom at Calgary and at Edmonton because you should win those games, and if you don’t play your best goaltender and lose, the failure to secure those two points might cost you a playoff spot. At Calgary, the Wild roared to a 4-1 lead, and as the fans booed the Flames, they flared to life and rallied for two late goals. Backstrom held on, and the Wild won 4-3. Taking nothing away from the Stars backup goaltending, but a few great late saves by Backstrom proved the merit of him being between the pipes.
The loss at San Jose, yes, that was not the Wild’s finest hour, but it wasn’t a bad night to be off, because the Sharks are good enough to beat you when you’re at your best.
That brought about the current, final homestand, with the Wild playing host to Calgary, Los Angeles, and Edmonton, Friday, before going on the road to face Colorado on Saturday in the finish of the regular season. The race was so tight that winning at Calgary and Edmonton lifted the Wild to third place in the West, but losing at San Jose dropped them quickly, and coming home and losing to Calgary left them tied with Columbus for seventh and eighth places in the West with three games left. The critics hissed about the Wild faltering against Calgary, but they played very well, dominating the first two periods, but couldn’t score after Zach Parise gained a 1-1 tie late in the first period.
The most precarious image was caused by Detroit and Dallas. The Red Wings — still one of the NHL’s elite teams — lurked only one point behind the Wild and Blue Jackets, and the Stars were only two points behind the Wings after winning in San Jose Tuesday night. All had three games left.
That’s why Tuesday night’s victory at Xcel Center over the Los Angeles Kings was so enormous. A loss by the Wild wouldn’t have spelled doom, but it would have allowed Detroit and Dallas to make it a photo finish. And, when you think about it, the Red Wings and the Stars have about a thousand times more tradition and experience about what it takes to make the playoffs than the still-maturing Minnesota Wild.
FORMULA 1 INNOVATION
The Bahrain Grand Prix, fourth in the long and tangled Formula 1 auto racing season, was broadcast at 6:30 a.m. last Sunday by NBC-Sports, a new sports network that swiped the Formula 1 rights from Speedvision. For years, Speedvision has done a magnificent job of presenting the best auto racing series in the world, with Bob Varsha’s deep and familiar voice doing the play-by-play, and David Hobbs, the clever Englishman and former racer himself, doing the color.
NBC-Sports, which wants to be a challenger for ABC’s ESPN stronghold, does a similarly good job with the broadcast, and they kept David Hobbs, but they’ve replaced Bob Varsha with Leigh Duffy. Now, Duffy does a very good job on play-by-play, maybe even as good as Varsha, but he, like Hobbs, is a proper Englishman with a proper English accent. Apparently nobody listened to any auditions by the two together, but when you hear an Englishman’s accent on play-by-play, and pertinent comments by another Englishman’s accent on color, it comes off as entirely too much English accent. The contrasting voices are no longer in contrast, and after four races, I appreciate the job Varsha did for over a decade even more.
As for the race, which was rebroadcast at high noon — a definite improvement from Sportsvision’s dawn-or-else telecasts — it was thoroughly entertaining from start to finish. The impressive 3.4-mile road-racing track is plopped down in the desert of Bahrain, wide enough to allow passing in several areas, and with three high-speed stretches where the F1 guys are all well over 180 miles per hour. I can’t recall seeing as much passing and side-by-side racing in a Formula 1 race.
Sebastian Vettel, the youthful German driver for Red Bull, won his fourth race in a row, but it was not without high drama. After Lotus driver Nico Rosburg surprised everyone and won the pole, he had a good start and cut across Vettel’s bow before Turn 1, allowing Fernando Alonso to also squeeze by for second in his red Ferrari. For three laps or so, the three shuffled positions in a breathtaking skirmish, before Vettel got ahead, then opened a small gap.
The fact he was able to maintain it throughout the rest of the 57-lap sprint around was a proper show of strength, but the dicing behind him was ferocious, and the cameras did an excellent job of capturing duels between the rest. After 18 laps, Vettel led and Red Bull teammate Mark Webber was second, but then it got crazy. Paul di Resta of Force India had his best race and contended up front most of the way before settling for fourth. Alonso had the flap that opens on the high rear wing stuck open, and he had to pit to have it sealed shut, and much as he struggled to stay with the leaders, he ultimately finished eighth.
One of the highlights of the race was that 50 percent of the commercials were done on a split-screen arrangement, where one-third of the screen stayed on the race leaders, while two-thirds flashed ads for Blackberry, Mobil 1, promotions for upcoming NHL broadcasts, Husqvarna, Mercedes, T-Mobile, Infiniti cars, CanAm ATVs, Rolex watches, Bridgestone tires, Evinrude outboards, Tire Rack, Mother’s car polish, Citi, and GoPro cameras. I can’t remember who ran the other ads, because when they interrupted the race, I dashed to the kitchen for more coffee. The no-interrupt idea is a good one, although a 50-50 split would be even more impressive, or an inset into the full-screen broadcast. And it’s something that sports like hockey should adopt, because it would be far better than the minute or two breaks that interrupt anything resembling rhythm.
With 10 laps remaining in the race, Kimi Raikonen, in the No. 1 Lotus, had gained second, trailing Vettel by about 11 seconds, while di Resta had all he could do to hold off Romain Grosjean, in the second Lotus for third. Close behind those two, Webber and Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton were battling for fifth. With five laps to go, Grosjean squeezed past di Resta for third just about the time Webber repassed Hamilton for fifth. Sergio Perez, in the second McLaren, had a bumping battle with teammate Jensen Button, then got by him, and remarkably passed Alonso. With two laps left, Hamilton and Webber were side-by-side through several turns, in one of the race’s top moments, and Hamilton edged ahead on the final lap to take fifth. Webber sagged just a bit after Hamilton passed him, and Perez also snuck by Webber just before the finish.
That left the finishing order: 1. Vettel; 2. Raikkonen; 3. Grosjean; 4. di Resta; 5. Hamilton; 6. Perez; 7. Webber; 8. Alonso; 9. Rosburg; and 10. Button. All 10 had their moments in contention in the race, something that rarely, if ever, has happened in Formula 1 in the last two decades. Vettel, on the podium for Red Bull with Lotus teammates Raikkonen and Grosjean joining him, made the comment on how it was a big day for Renault engineering as well, since the top three finishers all were powered by Renault engines.
Actually, it was a big day for Formula 1, because it proved the series can be more than a chess-match of manipulating tire compounds or trading 3-second pit stops. Wheel-to-wheel racing is the best, and when you see the world’s best drivers in the world’s best cars, on the world’s best road courses racing that way, it’s a solid 2 hours of entertainment.
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About the Author
John Gilbert is a lifetime Minnesotan and career journalist, specializing in cars and sports during and since spending 30 years at the Minneapolis Tribune, now the Star Tribune. More recently, he has continued translating the high-tech world of autos and sharing his passionate insights as a freelance writer/photographer/broadcaster. A member of the prestigious North American Car and Truck of the Year jury since 1993. John can be heard Monday-Friday from 9-11am on 610 KDAL(www.kdal610.com) on the "John Gilbert Show," and writes a column in the Duluth Reader.
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