Latendresse leads Wild to 4-3 victory over Pens

ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) — Guillaume Latendresse scored the go-ahead goal midway through the third period after getting a career-high three assists, giving the Minnesota Wild enough to beat the Pittsburgh Penguins 4-3 on Monday night.

For only the fifth time in 22 games this season, the Penguins lost after scoring first, this time on Sidney Crosby’s early goal, his 28th to match Marian Gaborik for second place in the NHL.

Pascal Dupuis set up that score and added a goal of his own for Pittsburgh, which again struggled on the power play and had another quiet game from struggling star Evgeni Malkin.

Latendresse, who came from Montreal in a trade two months ago, assisted on Cal Clutterbuck’s go-ahead goal midway through the second period.

Then in the final frame, during a 2-on-3 rush, Kyle Brodziak drew the defense out and found Latendresse sneaking in behind Alex Goligoski for position to punch in the winner. Latendresse has 10 goals and five assists in 20 games with Minnesota.

The Penguins killed off a five-minute power play after a major interference penalty on Sergei Gonchar for clobbering Clutterbuck, but they weren’t able to break through down the stretch. Mark Eaton’s slap shot had tied the game at 3.

Niklas Backstrom made 35 saves after making 34 in Minnesota’s 2-1 win at Pittsburgh in October. The Penguins, playing the second on a five-game road trip, are 2-2 after a five-game losing streak.

The Wild, emboldened by their improbable comeback against league-leading Chicago from a four-goal deficit in the third period to beat the Blackhawks in a shootout, answered both Penguins goals in the first two periods.

Latendresse led a rush and fed Eric Belanger for his 12th goal, one off Andrew Brunette’s team lead. Belanger’s shot took a funny bounce, as if it were a grounder to shortstop on artificial baseball grass, and glanced off Fleury and into the net to tie it at 1.

Despite nearly doubling the home team’s scoring chances for more than two-thirds of the game, the Penguins let the Wild overwhelm them with energy from the fifth-largest regular-season crowd in franchise history and take the lead in the middle of the game.

Then after the Penguins whiffed on another power play opportunity, Latendresse — who served a too-many-men penalty — joined the rush a few seconds after it expired and made a deft inside pivot on Goligoski and maneuvered a shot around him for the lead.