Postgame Hat Trick: Wild 6, Sharks 3

On Saturday night, the Wild scored a 6-3 victory over the San Jose Sharks at SAP Center in San Jose, Calif.
Wild.com's Dan Myers provides three takeaways in the Postgame Hat Trick, presented by Associated Bank. Learn more on how to score up to $500 by opening a Wild Checking account.

1. They're in.
Minnesota entered the night riding a six-game winning streak and a seven-game point streak, which each tied season highs.
All the Wild needed to do was extend that win streak one further and it would clinch a playoff spot for a second-straight season.
Mission accomplished.

With nine games remaining in the regular season, the Wild has indeed clinched a spot in the postseason, the earliest Minnesota has ever done so - made even more impressive by the fact that it's a truncated 56-game season.

The Wild will now return home for a seven-game homestand beginning Wednesday night against St. Louis. Minnesota has been one of the top home clubs in the NHL this season, so its seven-game winning streak has a chance to continue for awhile if it continues to have success at Xcel Energy Center.

Minnesota becomes the third team in the NHL to clinch a playoff spot. All three reside in the West Division, as the Wild, Vegas Golden Knights and Colorado Avalanche have really separated themselves from the other five teams in the division.
With seven home games on the docket, the Wild will now try and make a push for a division title over the final couple weeks of the season. Minnesota is done with Colorado, so it'll need some help there, but the Wild does have two games left against the division-leading Golden Knights coming up in early May.
The postseason berth marks the Wild's eighth trip in the past nine years, which coincides with the team's signing of Zach Parise and Ryan Suter in the summer of 2012.
2. Another fantastic first.
The Wild has been the NHL's best first period team this season, entering the night with a plus-18 goal differential that ranked No. 1 in the League.
Minnesota added to that early, and often, on Saturday.
Just 19 seconds into the game, Ryan Suter's short-side shot eluded Martin Jones and put the Wild ahead after one shift.

Almost 12 minutes later, it was 2-0 when Marcus Foligno scored his second goal of the road trip and ninth of the season, finishing off a 2-on-1 rush that was led by Joel Eriksson Ek.
Late in the period, it was 3-0 when Suter's defensive partner, Jared Spurgeon, got into the act, taking a nice feed from Ryan Hartman and flipping a wrist shot by Jones for his sixth of the year.

Foligno and Spurgeon got credit for the goals, but both were set up by heady plays by Eriksson Ek and Hartman to create space and take a defenseman with them, opening up room for the shooters to get in place.
In addition to its offensive outburst to start the game, the Wild did a nice job limiting San Jose's ability to get much going in its own end, holding the Sharks to just one quality scoring chance in all (more on that below).
3. An early turning point.
Just moments before Foligno made it 2-0, credit Wild goaltender Kaapo Kahkonen with making perhaps the save of the night on Sharks defenseman Marc-Edouard Vlasic, who had a grade-A scoring chance thanks to a perfect redirection of a silky pass from Patrick Marleau through a Wild defenseman.
Kahkonen was in great position, however, making a huge stop.

The puck sat in front of the crease, where it was scooped up by Eriksson Ek, who flew out of the defensive zone and ... well, the rest is history.
Kahkonen's save was lost in the shuffle of a crazy few seconds, but at the end of it, Minnesota led 2-0 instead of the game being tied 1-1. Who knows how differently the game might have turned out otherwise.