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Koivu's late goal keeps Wild rolling at home

Oct 22, 2007 - 2:33 AM ST. PAUL, Minnesota (Ticker) -- Mikko Koivu helped the Minnesota Wild continue their winning ways at home.

Koivu scored the game-winning goal late in the third period and goaltender Niklas Backstrom stopped 29 shots as the Wild posted a 3-2 victory over the Colorado Avalanche on Sunday.

Mark Parrish and Brian Rolston scored power-play goals two minutes apart in the second period for Minnesota, which has won seven straight here dating to last season, and remains the only team in the league yet to lose in regulation.

With the game tied at 2-2, Koivu gathered a loose puck in the Colorado end, skated around the right side of the net and slipped a backhander past goaltender Peter Budaj for a 3-2 lead with 3:04 remaining.

"Of course, you want to win it like that," Koivu said. "When you get two points in the regular time, it's always good for the team. You have to play 60 minutes first and see where it goes. I think tonight in the third period all the way, we got the good effort."

While the Wild keeping winning at home, the road struggles continue for the Avalanche, who have lost four straight road games to open a season for the first time since 1991-92, when the franchise was located in Quebec.

"It's two games in a row where we have battled back on the road to tie something up and get nothing out of it," Colorado left wing Andrew Brunette said.

"Tonight was a good road game for us," he said. "I thought we battled pretty hard in St. Louis and Chicago, we just didn't get anything out of it. Just extremely disappointed in the last two when you're tied late in the game, and you can't get anything out of it."

Minnesota took a 1-0 lead in the second with a power-play goal by Parrish, who received a feed from Pavol Demitra and was all alone in front of Budaj.

Parrish took the puck in front of the goal crease, moved it to his backhand and flipped it up over Budaj for his second goal of the season with 14:40 left in the session.

Just two minutes later, Parrish screened Budaj on a slap shot from Rolston that beat the Colorado goaltender to the left side for a 2-0 lead.

With a two-man advantage, Kurtis Foster collected an errant pass from Demitra and fed the puck to Rolston, who used the screen to beat Budaj for his third goal of the season.

"When you give a shooter like Rolston that amount of time to walk into one, whether I am there or not, there is a good chance that puck is going in," Parrish said.

The Avalanche finally got on the board with 6:51 left in the second. After a scramble in front of the net, Tyler Arnason found a loose puck and made a wild flip as he was falling down that found the back of the net.

Colorado tied the game at 2-2 with 8:22 left in the second. Brunette was alone on the backside of the goal and beat Backstrom for his second tally of the season.

"We have a lot of confidence, but we have to be careful and not get overly confident," Parrish said. "We saw what happened when we took the foot off the gas a little bit there at the end of the second period, especially against a team with the skill like Colorado. They really took it to us there for a few shifts. Luckily we woke back up in time and pulled out a win."

Budaj stopped 32 shots for the Avalanche, who were 1-for-6 on the power play.

"I think we played a strong game, but unfortunately not strong enough," Budaj said. "We've got to win these games, especially the last five minutes. We've got to stay close, and not let the opposition score."