Golden Knights’ slide increases chances of facing Wild in playoffs

As the Golden Knights dropped points in the standings over the past five days, the likelihood of facing the Minnesota Wild in the first round of the playoffs increased.

That adds another dimension to the finale of the season series Wednesday at Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Not only are the Knights trying to maintain their tenuous grip on first place, but a victory would remove any psychological barrier that could develop ahead of a potential postseason series against their nemesis.

“It’s not like we’re not competitive. We’re really close, and we’ve got to get on the right side of that line,” coach Pete DeBoer said Tuesday. “Whether that happens tomorrow night or in the playoffs if we happen to meet them, I’m confident that this isn’t going to be a mental block that we’re going to carry around.”

A week ago, the Knights (36-13-2, 74 points) led the West Division by six points with eight games to play, but have since lost two of three to open the door for second-place Colorado to close the gap to two points.

Minnesota is lurking four points back in third place and threatens to derail the Knights’ promising season if they meet in the postseason.

Historically, the Knights have had difficulty with the Wild and dropped five straight in the series after Monday’s devastating 6-5 loss.

They’ve yet to solve Minnesota on the road in three tries this season and are 1-6 all time at Xcel Energy Center. The win was in a shootout Oct. 6, 2018.

The Wild are one of the NHL’s best home teams at 19-5-1 and top the league in home points percentage and goals per game since Jan. 31.

“Obviously we want to put the doubt in their mind that we can play with them and we can be successful against them,” said winger Jonathan Marchessault, who is set to appear in his 400th NHL game. “The main thing for the next game to make sure that we’re ready for playoffs is how good defensively we can be, and that starts in front of our net and helping our defensemen.”

Goalie Marc-Andre Fleury is in line to start and can pass Roberto Luongo for third on the NHL’s all-time wins list. The Knights probably will be without leading goal scorer Max Pacioretty, who is considered day to day with an undisclosed injury.

The Knights squandered leads of 4-2 and 5-3 against the Wild on Monday, and goalie Robin Lehner shouldered his share of the blame for the third-period collapse.

It was the Knights’ fourth straight one-goal loss to Minnesota, to go with a 2-0 setback March 8 that featured an empty-net goal in the final seconds, but Marchessault was not concerned there would be a lingering effect.

“Obviously it’s a little late in the season to learn from a difficult loss like that, but I think it’s going to benefit us in the long run,” he said. “We can’t take any teams for granted. They’re a great team, they’re a resilient team. They work hard, and we’ve been struggling against them. Next game it’s all about us.”

Contact David Schoen at dschoen@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-5203. Follow @DavidSchoenLVRJ on Twitter.