Boudreau likes the Wild's effort, but players are still stung by loss

Wild coach Bruce Boudreau was trying to emphasize the positive after Wednesday's 4-2 loss at Toronto. Not all of his players seemed to be on board.

Boudreau praised the Wild for a far stronger effort than it put forth Monday in a loss at Boston that began its four-game road trip. Still, the players could not get past the disappointment of losing their third game in a row. Some additional tidbits on Wednesday's game:

--Jason Zucker had a solid game, scoring the Wild's only two goals and registering five shots on goal (Mikko Koivu had a game-high seven). He wasn't as positive as Boudreau was.

"It's a step in the right direction,'' Zucker said. "But we've got to bear down. We've got to score. In all aspects of our game, we need to bear down and get one of these wins and go from there.

"We need to face it. We can't put it behind us and just forget about it. We need to be better. We need to use it.''

--Goalie Devan Dubnyk, pressed into an unexpected start when Alex Stalock went home for the birth of his second child, had another weird goal bounce off of him. This time, it was a shot that hit the end boards, then the back of his skate for Toronto's first goal of the game.

A stand-up guy, Dubnyk always answers questions after games. Wednesday, he seemed a bit frustrated by a run of games that have not been up to his usual standards.

"I don't know what you want me to say,'' he said. "I thought we played a good game. I don't know what else to tell you.

"It's tough. I'm not going to lie. After each game you tell yourself it's bound to stop, and it keeps going. There's nothing you can do about it. Just try to keep playing my game. It's getting old.''

Dubnyk thought the first goal, scored by Nazem Kadri, might have come off a high stick. "I just wasn't sure,''' he said. "On the replay, it looks like it could've possibly been. It went off his stick and I lost it. I heard it hit the boards. I was just trying to get back to my post.''

Boudreau also asked the officials whether it was a high stick and was told it was not. Regarding the fluky nature of that goal, he said, "It is tough, and it is deflating, but I thought we handled it well. We came back and scored.''

--Boudreau sat winger Chris Stewart for most of the third period. Marcus Foligno and Matt Cullen didn't play much in the third, either. Asked whether Stewart was benched for mistakes he made on Toronto's second and third goals, the coach said it wasn't "for any particular reason" and that he just chose to roll three lines.