Marc-Andre Fleury and the Minnesota Wild suffered a lopsided Game 2 loss to the Dallas Stars on Wednesday night, getting crushed 7-3 at the American Airlines Center to even their first-round series at a game apiece. The veteran goaltender blamed himself for the dismal performance after the loss.
“Oh man, embarrassing on my part giving up seven goals like that in the [Stanley Cup] Playoffs,” Fleury said, according to NHL.com's Tracey Myers.
“You know, I want to come in and give a chance to my team to stay in the game and win, and that's not what I did. I gave up too many goals. I think we had to open up to try to come back in the game and we gave up more chances, but bottom line, I didn't make any good key saves in the game.”
It was a surprising move for Wild coach Dean Evason to go with the 38-year-old, who has been just average this season, over budding star Filip Gustavsson, especially after he made made 51 saves on 53 shots in the team's 3-2 double overtime win in Game 1.
It just doesn't make sense to not play the 24-year-old Swede after he turned in one of the best regular seasons of any starting goaltender this season, especially after he led the Wild to an opening game victory on the road.
In Game 2, Wild's Marc-Andre Fleury allowed seven goals on just 31 shots, but Evason defended his decision to continue rotating his goalies, as he did in the regular season.
“It's what we do, right? We've done it all year,” he explained. “The game, nothing was on [Fleury] tonight. It was all on us.”
Still, the seven goals were tied for the most Fleury has allowed in an NHL playoff game. He gave up the same amount while playing for the Pittsburgh Penguins in an 8-5 loss to the Philadelphia Flyers in Game 2 of the 2012 Stanley Cup Playoffs, per Myers.
It's safe to say that Filip Gustavsson will be back in between the pipes for Game 3 as the series shifts to Minnesota on Friday night.
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