Postgame Hat Trick: Blackhawks 4, Wild 3 (OT)

Wild.com's Dan Myers gives three takeaways from the Wild's 4-3 overtime loss against the Chicago Blackhawks at Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul on Wednesday night:

1. Like it did in this season's first meeting against Chicago, the Wild (35-12-6) found itself in a 2-0 hole before rallying to tie the game.
Ryan Hartman scored midway through the first period and Nick Schmaltz made it 2-0 just over a minute into the second before the Wild played its best hockey of the game over the next eight minutes.

Less than a minute after Schmaltz made it 2-zip, Jared Spurgeon started the rally with a snipe from the right face-off dot that crept under the crossbar for his seventh goal of the year.

Hawks goaltender Corey Crawford was spectacular during the next few minutes, but could only hold the Wild off the scoreboard for so long. After turning away Alex Tuch, Chris Stewart, Jason Zucker, Nate Prosser and Eric Staal, it was Zach Parise who finally broke through against Crawford, scoring on a rebound of his own tip-in try at 7:15 of the period.
Chicago challenged the initial play as offsides, and after a lengthy review that lasted more than six minutes, officials decided there wasn't enough evidence to overturn the call.
"I think it's believability that they can come back. We never felt out of it at any stretch," said Wild coach Bruce Boudreau. "I thought in the second period, usually in the past, this year at least, when we get going like that we usually end up getting three or four goals in a row fairly quickly. We had the opportunities, and when they needed a save, they got it. It was the same thing in overtime. We had three really good opportunities to score and we didn't, and usually [when] you don't score on a great opportunity, bad things happen."

Parise now has three goals over his past five games and 11 on the season (44 games).
"I didn't think it was going to count, to be honest," Parise said. "We've got that TV behind our bench. I don't know exactly what they decided, but luckily they didn't make a decision against, but I thought they were going to call it back."
"He worked really hard tonight and when you work really hard, good things happen," Boudreau said of Parise. "It's baby steps, but he's getting better. He's feeling it a little bit more."
2. The loss snapped Minnesota's eight-game winning streak against Chicago (33-17-5), a streak that began Feb. 4, 2015 with a 3-0 win at United Center.
The Wild won all of the ensuing seven contests, including all five last season and the first game this season. The streak ended one game shy of the Wild's franchise record for mastery of a single opponent, a pair of nine-game winning streaks against Arizona (Jan. 2006-Nov. 2008) and Chicago (Jan. 2006-Jan. 2008).
The eight-game stretch was tied for the fifth-longest active streak in the NHL, according to Elias Sports Bureau.
Minnesota dropped to 14-6-2 over its past 22 games against its division rival, and now leads the Blackhawks by five points for the top spot in the Central. The Wild still has two games in hand.
"It was kind of a playoff game environment, a little bit," said Wild forward Erik Haula. "It's always fun when you play those guys. We've had their number lately and I thought it was a really big point for us."

3. After being turned away time after time by a red-hot Crawford, Haula tied the game with 3:03 to play in regulation.

Moments after Matt Dumba, then Charlie Coyle, were stopped on great chances, it took a quick rush opportunity and a fantastic backhand set up by defenseman Marco Scandella to tie it up.
Scandella, who had jumped into the rush, feathered a pretty saucer pass to Haula crashing the crease, and the former Golden Gopher redirected it into the goal, sending the home fans in attendance into a frenzy.
"[I] thought we broke it out good," Haula said. "I thought Nino made a good play on the wall there and me and Marco were able to beat our guys all the way up the ice."
The goal was Haula's 11th of the year. Scandella, who snapped a nine-game point drought with an assist Tuesday in Winnipeg, now has points in back-to-back games.
Minnesota didn't get the victory, but the goal allowed the Wild to come away with a point in the standings.
"To get that goal at the end and tie the game and get a point, it was a good game both ways," Parise said. "I thought they played well. We had a lot of good looks, a lot of good chances, some pipes. It would have been nice to get one of our power plays, but back-to-back, against these guys, they're a tough team."

Loose pucks

• Wild forward Charlie Coyle played in his 284th consecutive game, a new franchise record.

• Darcy Kuemper made 28 saves for Minnesota.
• Chicago goaltender Corey Crawford had 35 saves.
• The Wild dropped to 4-3-2 on the second half of back-to-backs this season.
• Jason Pominville assisted on Parise's goal and now has 10 assists and 14 points since Jan. 19 (10 games). Both are the most in the NHL over that span.
• Attendance: 19,326 (largest of the season)

He said it

"We were getting our chances and he was coming up with answers. We stuck with it and got that goal to tie it late. He played really good for them. He seemed to have an answer for a lot of our chances." -- Wild goaltender Darcy Kuemper on the play of Chicago netminder Corey Crawford

They said it

"I don't think we get too far in that game if he doesn't make some of those big stops, especially on the breakaway, a couple huge ones in overtime ... [Crawford] played great. I think that's a big part of beating a team like that, especially the way they're playing right now." -- Blackhawks captain Jonathan Toews on Crawford

Three stars

* Jonathan Toews
\\ Jared Spurgeon
\\* Richard Panik