Wild's weak start 'not acceptable' in 4-3 loss to Ottawa

OTTAWA – The game-deciding play came late in the third period, a blistering shot off the rush that slammed the breaks on the Wild's attempt at a comeback.

But the team's demise can be traced back to the beginning, a poor start that paved the way for a 4-3 letdown to the struggling Senators on Tuesday in front of 7,602 at Canadian Tire Centre for the Wild's third loss over the past four games.

"Anyone can beat anyone any night, and they came out outworking us in the first period and that's just not acceptable," defenseman Jon Merrill said. "We've got to be a team that comes out and gets to our game real quick and outwork teams, and we just didn't do enough of that in the first period [Tuesday] and I thought that was the difference."

Ottawa's Thomas Chabot skated into the Wild's end and wired the puck by goalie Cam Talbot with 5 minutes, 45 seconds to go in the third period, nixing a 3-3 tie with his second goal and third point of the night and snapping the Wild's nine-game win streak vs. the Senators.

Twice before then, the Wild evened the score after climbing out of a two-goal hole, a deficit that developed early.

"[At] 3-3, I thought we were going to win the game for sure," Kevin Fiala said of the Wild, which has a league-high six multi-goal come-from-behind victories this season. "I thought we had it under control. But if we start better, we give ourselves a better chance to win the game."

Ottawa capitalized on its first shot, a wind-up from Chabot at 2:09, before doubling their lead on the power play.

"We tried to skate through them," coach Dean Evason said. "We tried to stick-handle through them, and we turned pucks over."

In the second the Wild was better, but the improvement wasn't enough to move ahead of Ottawa.

Fiala got the rally started at 6:31 with a shot from between the circles that was his third goal in two games and 17th overall, tying Marcus Foligno and Mats Zuccarello (who didn't play because of an upper-body injury) for the third most on the team.

Then, at 12:40, Fiala's clearing attempt was gobbled up by Ryan Hartman and he passed off to captain Jared Spurgeon for a rising shot that sailed by Senators goalie Anton Forsberg, who totaled 40 saves. Talbot had 30 in his third consecutive loss.

Before the period ended, Ottawa reclaimed momentum; a Josh Brown shot hit traffic in front, and Tim Stutzle pounced on the carom at 16:22.

This time, Merrill supplied the equalizer after pinching in along the left side and flinging in a top-shelf shot 4:32 into the third period for his career-high fourth goal.

"I just took advantage of the opportunity and closed my eyes and ripped it," said Merrill, whose 15 points have matched his career best from 2018-19.

But like they did earlier, the Senators retaliated to shrug off the Wild for good and that soured the outlook of this four-game road trip.

A successful outcome is now in jeopardy because after splitting stops in Edmonton and Ottawa, the Wild moves on to Eastern Conference powerhouse Toronto and then Calgary, which has won 10 in a row.

"I don't care who you're playing in this league," Evason said. "This league is too good to spot teams continually, and that [Senators] team just continued to play the same way. We started wrong. They started right."