Postgame: Wild don't show in Winnipeg, fail to seal up playoff spot

Tonight would have been so surprising and so disappointing if the Wild wasn't so doggone predictable.

The Wild, maddeningly inconsistent from Game 1 to 80 this season, tried to play it cool afterward like it'll simply go home and all will be cured. But there's zero excuse for the Wild coming out so ill-prepared with such little battle and energy to its game. The Wild had Saturday off and a playoff spot would have been secured if it just took care of business by beating a team that was tied for the third-fewest points in the NHL.

But by a 5-1 score, those Winnipeg Jets beat the Wild for a fourth time in five games this season.

Goalie Devan Dubnyk was honest afterward, saying the Wild will get "throttled" in the first round of the playoffs if it plays this way.

Three losses in a row, yet the Wild's basically on a verge of a playoff spot because the Avalanche is just as bad if not worse (three losses in a row, five in its last six).

So one Wild win in its last two games or two lost points by the Avs in their final three games means the Wild will get awarded with likely Dallas or St. Louis in the first round. The Blues beat the heck out of the Avs tonight to help out their potential first-round matchup.

The Wild plays San Jose at home Tuesday, the Avs play in Nashville, which happens to be the site of their last win four games ago.

"We weren't good tonight," defenseman Ryan Suter said. "We got back to within one and then we gave them a pretty easy one. It's disappointing that we didn't play harder with a chance to seal it up here, but you can't get down at this point of the year. We're sitting in a good spot still, and we just have to get it going the last two games.

"I just think we weren't ready. It was their last game at home. We knew they were going to come out with a lot of energy. They did. We did a pretty good job weathering it, gave up a couple power plays and never got the momentum back."

First period was going well until a reaching Jordan Schroeder, after coach John Torchetti entrusted the fourth line with an offensive-zone draw after an icing, took a high-sticking penalty. Mark Scheifele nullified that, but when the 4-on-4 ended and the Wild was going to get a power play, Nino Niederreiter took an offensive-zone hooking penalty eight seconds into the advantage.

The Jets, who hadn't scored a power-play goal in 10 games, scored their first of two in the game for a 1-0 lead.

In the second, Torchetti mixed up the only line doing anything in the first period – Zach Parise, Mikko Koivu and Mikael Granlund – because the other three lines were doing nothing. He put Charlie Coyle back on the top line at right wing, Granlund back to second-line center.

Didn't spark anything and finally a Granlund turnover led to fourth-liner Chris Thornurn's first goal in 48 games off a breakaway. 2-zip.

"We're not getting three of our top four lines going. We're only getting maybe 1 ½," Torchetti said.

In the third, Torchetti reunited Parise-Koivu-Granlund and Granlund scored his third goal in five games.

Back in the game after working so hard, and just 1:25 later, it's 3-1 again because Schroeder lost an offensive-zone battle, Jason Zucker and Granlund were skated through in the neutral zone and Matt Dumba, who was awful from start to finish tonight, was walked around en route to an Andrew Copp. Suter didn't help matters by not taking the body, like Dumba. "Two stick checks on one play," Torchetti bemoaned.

"We had one [full] power play. That just says it all for me," Torchetti said. "We're not gritty enough right now. We have to pay a price a whole lot more getting home against San Jose.

"We have to go back and find our game." He said the Wild's third-forward high is cheating on pucks where they have a five percent chance of recovering the puck.

"That's just not how we play," he said.

Thomas Vanek missed the game with an upper-body injury, but the big loss right now is Jared Spurgeon. The Wild can't exit the zone and that's a factor in the lack of threats offensively from many forwards.

"Some of our guys have to up their ante as players," Torchetti said.

Two are Marco Scandella and Dumba.

On Scandella, Torchetti said, "We need him to use his size a little bit more. Marco's a big guy. We need him to be more physical."

On Dumba, Torchetti said, "Gotta be on that defensive side of the puck better. He's trying to do too much. He has to play a two way game."

Koivu said, "We have to be a lot better than that. … We cost ourselves. We need to learn from our mistakes and prepare better. That's the bottom line. We've got to know that. I don't even care about the situation we're in. We're talking about getting our team game better. You can win or you can lose, but as long as we're playing like that, that's not acceptable."

Dubnyk said, "We didn't play even close to good enough tonight. We've got to figure it out here. We've got two games left.

"We're going to get throttled [in the playoffs] if we're going to play like this. I'm not worried about it, I don't think we are, but we all know that's not even going to come close come playoff time. We don't want to be sliding in.

"We have two games to get on track here and I'm sure that's what we'll do."

On the lack of effort or urgency, Dubnyk said, "Strange. We've got to be ready to play playoff hockey from the start of the game. Last three we have moments where we start to play, … and then we let things happen that shouldn't be.

"We have to be absolutely desperate from the drop of the puck. It's not there right now. I know this group will find a way."

That's it from me. Kent Youngblood is covering practice Monday. Barring a flight delay or horrible traffic once I land at 8 a.m., I will be filling in for Paul Allen on KFAN from 9-noon. Guests include Anthony LaPanta, Justin Gaard from the Final Four, Lavelle E. Neal III on the Twins season opener, maybe Brent Burns and others.

Also, I'll be hosting the Russo-Souhan Show solo at Tom Reid's before the season finale at 3 p.m. Saturday.