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Rolston, Radivojevic net Wild win over Canucks

Mar 22, 2008 - 5:45 AM VANCOUVER, British Columbia (Ticker) -- Brian Rolston and Branko Radivojevic each scored a goal and Niklas Backstrom made 30 saves as the Minnesota Wild strengthened their position atop the Northwest Division with a 2-1 triumph over the Vancouver Canucks on Friday.

Pavol Demitra added two assists for Minnesota (40-26-9), which won its fourth in a row and increased its lead in the division to three points over Vancouver (38-27-10) and idle Calgary (38-26-10).

"It's big for us to win in regulation and get two points," Backstrom said. "You need points every night, and it's good we got two."

"I liked the way we played," Minnesota coach Jacques Lemaire added. "I know they had some good chances, but I think we played hard the whole game and, you know, you're looking at the division (and) you see why we're all together. Games could go on either side. Extremely happy to win this game."

Defenseman Sami Salo scored and All-Star Roberto Luongo made 19 saves for Vancouver, which saw its three-game winning streak come to an end and remained in a sixth-place tie with Calgary in the Western Conference.

"It's disappointing that we couldn't come up with a win here," Canucks captain Markus Naslund said. "(I) thought we generated quite a bit in the second (period) there, but we just didn't find those real quality chances.

"I guess we've got a bunch of divisional games coming up, so we've still got a chance. We play them another time, too, but definitely, home game against (Minnesota), you want to win."

Rolston opened the scoring just 4:52 into the second period.

With Minnesota on the power play, Rolston unleashed a wrist shot from the left faceoff circle that looked to be sailing wide of the net. But it deflected off the right hip of former Wild defenseman Willie Mitchell and past Luongo for his 28th goal of the season.

"It was probably going two feet wide and it went off Willie," Rolston said of his goal. "It was a nice break for us."

"They got really lucky on the first goal, and really that was the difference in the game right there," Luongo said.

For the 35-year-old Rolston, it was the seventh time in eight games he has recorded at least one point.

Radivojevic doubled Minnesota's advantage just 93 seconds into the third, deflecting a cross-ice backdoor feed by Demitra past Luongo for his sixth goal.

"I had a 2-on-1 with (Pavol), and he made a great play," Radivojevic said. "It was a great pass, and all I had to do was hit the net."

Salo halved the deficit less than three minutes later.

With Vancouver on the power play, the defenseman blasted a shot from just inside the blue line past a screened Backstrom at 4:20 for his sixth of the campaign.

"Tonight, our goal was just to get pucks at their net and go for the rebound," Salo said. "Taylor Pyatt made a great screen on that play and the puck just happened to fall in."