I'm nothing if not Mr. Positive, so I come with good news.
The Wild still gained ground on 7th-place Nashville and 8th-place Colorado tonight with a 4-3 overtime loss to Dallas. Both of them lost in regulation, and the Wild moved within two points.
The Wild has a game in hand on the Preds, three on the Avs. But the tricky thing about "games in hand" is they're absolutely, utterly, entirely meaningless if you NEVER, EVER WIN!!!
But I digress.
The Wild fell to 1-10 in overtimes and shootouts with tonight's John Klingberg dagger. The Stars star defenseman scored his second OT winner against the Wild this season and the Stars' third overall.
After Jamie Benn fed him in the high slot, Klingberg said, "I had a lot of time to aim where I wanted to shoot, so I was trying to go high and it was nice to see it go in."
He had a lot of time because the Wild gave up an odd-man rush because Thomas Vanek finally chose to change after a 70-second shift. He had a chance to change about 20 seconds before, but instead curled right and went back into the zone.
Finally, Mikey Reilly sent him a bouncing back in the neutral zone. Tired at the end of a long shift, Vanek probably should have chipped it and change. Instead, he shoveled it to the bench saying that he thought Reilly would continue into the offensive zone. He didn't. He changed for Marco Scandella.