Defensive juggernaut Wild blows out Lightning with six even-strength goals, one shortie

In as balanced of a Wild attack as you'll see, the Wild scored six even-strength goals and one shorthanded goal in Saturday's 7-2 pounding of the Tampa Bay Lightning.

No doubt the Wild caught the banged-up team tired and ready to get home at the end of a five-game road trip, but the Lightning is still a dangerous Eastern Conference contender led by goal-scorer Steven Stamkos. He was limited to two shots and the Lightning 19 as the NHL's best defensive team scored more goals tonight than it has allowed in six games this season (six).

The Wild had six different goal scorers – Jason Zucker (two), Marco Scandella, Mikko Koivu, Erik Haula (winner), Zach Parise and Jared Spurgeon – for the first time since Oct. 7, 2006 vs. Nashville (6-5). Thirteen different Wild players had at least a point, with Zucker, Scandella, Parise, Thomas Vanek and Jason Pominville having two each. Fourteen of the Wild's 18 skaters was plus-1 or better, with Ryan Suter putting up a well-earned plus-4 and Jonas Brodin a plus-3.

The Wild wants to boast itself as a team that has three lines that can score, but it certainly looks six games into the season like a team four lines deep and certainly four defensemen who can join the attack.

The Wild now leaves Sunday for a quick, back-to-back road swing to New York and Boston before returning home for a three-game homestand beginning Thursday against San Jose. If you didn't read my previous blog, defensemen Keith Ballard and Christian Folin won't be on the trip.

If you don't know why, please read that blog for a strange story that so far the Wild looks like it has isolated to just them.

Judging by the Wild's fast-paced game tonight, nobody else has been affected.

Coach Mike Yeo liked the way the Wild came out of the gate. It recognized it was playing a tired team and came out with jump and didn't allow a shot in the first 11:04. The Wild generated a ton of odd-man rushes because of how well it was playing in its own zone and the neutral zone.

Zucker scored twice and Yeo said, "I'm real pleased with how he's coming along. The second goal is a good indication of that. We're using him in at least one rotation of every penalty kill right now and he's earning that."

The Wild killed four penalties and has now killed 18 of 19 opposing power plays (2^nd in the NHL, 94.7 percent).

Superstitious Yeo didn't want to talk about the PK, a PK that ranked 27^th last year: "Let's keep talking about the power play," he joked.

OK, the power play went 0 for 1 and is now 0 for 20! In fact the power play has been outscored by the penalty kill!

Vanek, who has no goals, had two assists and was solid tonight, especially his cool setup for the sixth goal to set up a Spurgeon gimmee tap-in off a 2-on-1.

"That's why you have to be careful what you say sometimes on the bench," Yeo said, smiling. "Obviously I want him to get a goal. I'm saying, 'shoot, shoot,' and then he makes that pass, I'm like, 'Good play.' Apparently we don't think the game the same way offensively, and that's probably a good thing for him."

Everybody laughed. If you saw his quote at the end of my fire article in Saturday's paper, you know his sense of humor. In fact, when owner Craig Leipold read that quote at the end of my story today, Leipold could be heard howling from 10 rows down.

Yeo is very happy with the play of his defensemen. He said other than Kuemper, it was the D group that carried the Wild in Thursday's shutout over Arizona. So he was very happy to see them rewarded offensively tonight with all the big pluses and the goals by Scandella (Gordie Howe hat trick tonight) and Spurgeon.

He said the D is playing to the organization's expectations and "We believe these guys are a very good group, very mobile, a group that can make us a real tough team to play against because of their gap control, skating ability and one-on-one defending, but also the way they get up ice and are part of the attack."

Lightning coach Jon Cooper said he'll quickly brush this game aside: "This doesn't happen to us often."

Most impressive tonight was the Wild's balanced attack, getting goals from all four lines.

"Good teams have three lines that can score. Right now we have four that can really generate. It showed tonight," Vanek said.

Parise, always honest, said, "I think we caught them a little tired and [Evgeni] Nabokov had a little bit of an off night as well, but that being said we did a good job of taking away their speed and controlling the puck and making good plays through the neutral zone.

"It's fun when you're on the offensive side [of a 7-2 game]. You feel like if you do the right things in your own zone and make good plays, you're going to get odd man rushes. We had a lot of those tonight."

Parise also raved about the youngsters – guys like Haula, Coyle, Nino, Zucker, Granlund, Brodin: "This is not an easy league to break into. They're working hard and they're hungry to get better. Everyone's watching how much more confident they're playing with the puck. For our team that's really important. We play fast and we play with the puck and we have the type of team to do that."

That's it for now. No practice Sunday as the team flies to New York. In fact, I have a very early flight, so I'm out of here. Barring news, I'll come to you next from Madison Square Garden on Monday.