The Minnesota Wild lost to the Dallas Stars last night 1-zip and I was there to witness it. Dallas back-up goalie Mike Smith was excellent, much better than I had thought and much better than most of the Wild players had thought as well. The Wild did play hard. In fact Stephane Veilleux danced around for a good full two minutes while on the penalty killing team after busting his stick. He looked like a NBA guard and I would expect him to be getting a call from the Minnesota Timberwolves any time now. Veilleux definitely has a passion for playing well regardless of the circumstances. He blocked players, laid his body on the ice to block a potential shot and was just plain distracting to the Dallss Stars power play line that they never got anything together.

It was also a night of imaginary penalties. Matt Foy got a high sticking call that wasn’t even close to high sticking and they made it a double minor for 4 minutes! If anything the refs should have called it on Aaron Voros who was standing next to Foy. Perhaps they got the 83 vs 84 jersey number wrong, but Foy sat his time in the box despite a loud Xcel Energy Center crowd that was shouting and booing the refs. I heard a new ref insult, "Hey ref, your mom called and you suck" It doesn’t seem as funny now as it did when I had a few drinks in me, but anyway. Voros had plenty of his own time in the box and was his usual jaw jacking self. I have never seen an NHL player with so much to say to the other team and the refs. He duked it out with Krystopher Barch in the first period and effectively took him all the way down to the ice. The fight put Voros in the box for a long time including a 10 minute misconduct which they changed to a 10 minute instigating penalty? Whatever, he was in the box and wasn't quiet for even a minute.

It seemed like it was just a bad luck night for the Minnesota Wild who have to realize you can’t win a game unless you score and score more than once especially against top teams like Dallas and Detroit. Good thing we have a home game vs. the New York Islanders tomorrow night. The Wild will need a win to give them a confidence boost before heading out on a three game road trip.