There was commotion, desperation and maybe even a sense of dread as the Wild struggled to kill off an early penalty against those slumbering giants, the St. Louis Blues.
Then -- poof -- euphoria! Out of nowhere, from chaos to elation as Zach Parise raced down the ice to score an unlikely short-handed goal. Well, all short-handed goals are unexpected, aren't they? It's just that this one came at exactly the right time for Minnesota.
And that was it, really. The Blues never recovered. They certainly never came back to take a lead. Now it's time to tighten up the stanchions at the Xcel Energy Center and gird for the Chicago Blackhawks in what promises to be a real skate-a-thon between two welterweight rivals.