Gustavsson scores goalie goal for Wild in win against Blues

ST. LOUIS — Filip Gustavsson scored an empty-net goal and made 27 saves for the Minnesota Wild in a 4-1 win against the St. Louis Blues at Enterprise Center on Tuesday.

The Wild goalie gloved down a slap shot from the neutral zone from Blues forward Pavel Buchnevich. He then immediately put the puck down at his stick, dropped to a knee, and sent a shot through the air all the way into the offensive zone, where it rolled into the net with nine seconds remaining in the third period for the 4-1 final.

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“They took a time out there with 30 seconds left or something and ‘Flower’ [Wild goalie Marc-Andre Fleury] looked up at the board and said, ‘You should probably try it if you get the chance,'” Gustavsson said. “He said, ‘You’re shooting, right?’ I was like, ‘Yeah, maybe I should.’

“Coaches usually get mad if you try it with a one-goal lead and it becomes icing if you miss it, so up (3-1), if I get the chance, I’ll try it.”

Gustavsson is the 15th NHL goaltender to have been credited with a goal. The last was Tristan Jarry with the Pittsburgh Penguins on Nov. 30, 2023, against the Tampa Bay Lightning.

Wild coach John Hynes was coach of the Nashville Predators when Pekka Rinne scored a goalie goal against the Chicago Blackhawks on Jan. 9, 2020.

“It was one of my first couple games in Nashville,” Hynes said. “It was almost very similar to Gus’s. It was a 6-on-5 situation and they kind of dumped it in on the goalie and he had time to do it. Both guys, you could tell they were going for it. Great to see.”

Ryan Hartman, Jakub Lauko and Marco Rossi also scored, and Kirill Kaprizov had two assists for the Wild (2-0-2).

“Nice shot. We have same (amount) of goals,” Kaprizov joked.

Minnesota played the game without forwards Joel Eriksson Ek (broken nose) and Marcus Johansson (undisclosed), and defenseman Jared Spurgeon (lower body).

“It’s always bad to lose guys, especially ‘Spurg’, our captain, and ‘Ekky,'” Kaprizov said. “Both are great players and it’s how it is. We just try to play the hockey game.”

Mathieu Joseph scored, and Jordan Binnington made 23 saves for the Blues (2-2-0), who were playing their home opener after a three-game road trip to start the season.

“I think there’s still some areas in the game where we could have probably tightened it up and kind of put more pressure on them even,” Blues defenseman Justin Faulk said. “I think we were a little sloppy with the puck coming out of our zone and just kind of coming through the neutral zone and whatnot where we probably could have put our foot down a little bit more knowing they were a short-handed group tonight, dressing 11 forwards and a couple of their top guys were injured. There was more there to be had, obviously. The result is the result, but I think there’s a little bit more from our group tonight.”

Hartman gave the Wild a 1-0 lead at 3:50 of the first period with a power-play goal. Kaprizov carried the puck through the neutral zone and threaded a pass to Hartman, who drove to the net and beat Binnington with a wrist shot.

Lauko made it 2-0 at 7:52, scoring on a short-handed breakaway after receiving an outlet pass from Marat Khusnutdinov.

“The only thing I was thinking about was the guy (Blues forward Jordan Kyrou) that was behind me,” Lauko said. “I knew he was pretty fast, so I need to look for that. It was just instinct.”

Rossi made it 3-0 just 46 seconds into the third period. Mats Zuccarello drove through the right circle and flipped a backhand pass to Rossi for a tap-in at the top of the crease.

Joseph cut it to 3-1 at 10:10 with a wrist shot from the right circle.

“For 40 minutes we played some good hockey, and the goal in the third period took the wind out of our sails pretty quick,” Blues coach Drew Bannister said.

NOTES: Kaprizov played 27:59, the second-most ice time in his career in an NHL regular-season game. … Blues defenseman Philip Broberg had an assist to extend his point streak to four games (one goal, three assists).