It’s a Wild Night as Sharks Fall on Road

The Minnesota Wild are still stuck in last place as their second season winds down, but the signs of improvement are showing.

Pascal Dupuis, Richard Park and Sergei Zholtok scored, and the Wild beat San Jose, 3-1, Monday night at St. Paul, Minn. to prevent the Sharks from moving into second place in the Western Conference.

Manny Fernandez, who shut out the Sharks in November, made 18 saves for Minnesota, which ended a five-game losing streak with its 26th victory--one more than the Wild’s final total last season.

Fernandez was hopeful Minnesota can become a legitimate playoff contender next season.

“If we do have a chance next year, it would be great,” he said.

Patrick Marleau stretched his goal-scoring streak to five games for the Sharks, who dropped to 0-2-2 this season against Minnesota, which is last in the Northwest Division.

“We blew two points we needed tonight,” said defenseman Brad Stuart. “It’s disappointing to have a game like this--a game we really want to win and solidify our spot.”

The Sharks trail Northwest Division leader Colorado by one point with three games each to play. San Jose plays at Columbus on Wednesday and St. Louis on Thursday.

The Sharks finish the regular season at home Saturday against the Kings.

“They clogged us and wouldn’t let us get our feet going. We didn’t start doing anything until the third,” said right wing Todd Harvey. “We’ll have to look back on this game and kick ourselves.”

The Wild, eliminated from the playoff race more than a week ago, looked more like the team fighting for postseason positioning. San Jose missed a chance to set a franchise record for points and remains at 95.

On a power play in the first period, Dupuis scored on a rebound for a 1-0 lead.

The Sharks tied a season low with only two shots on goal in the second period, and the Wild made it 2-0 at 6:42 when Park scored his 10th goal on a pass from Zholtok.

Toronto 4, Columbus 1--Alexander Mogilny had a goal and an assist at Toronto in the Maple Leafs’ final regular-season home game. Jyrki Lumme, Robert Reichel and Bryan McCabe also scored for Toronto, which moved into sole possession of fourth place in the Eastern Conference, two points ahead of idle Ottawa. Both teams have three games left.

Florida 4, Philadelphia 4--Pierre Dagenais scored his second goal with 16.6 seconds left in the third period to give the Panthers a tie at Philadelphia. Philadelphia pulled within three points of the Eastern Conference-leading Boston Bruins. Each team has three games left.

Carolina 2, New York Islanders 1-- Rod Brind’Amour scored early in the third period to help the Hurricanes win at Uniondale, N.Y. The Hurricanes need one point to clinch the Southeast Division title.

New York Rangers 3, Pittsburgh 2--Pavel Bure scored two goals and Eric Lindros added another at New York as the Rangers won their fifth consecutive game.