Some of the issues that looked fixed two days ago in a decisive win against the Dallas Stars were again troubling for the Colorado Avalanche in a loss to the Minnesota Wild.

Without Kirill Kaprizov, Jonas Brodin and Jared Spurgeon, Minnesota played a smart, poised and gutsy game, pulling away in the third for a 3-1 victory at Ball Arena.

Sick and tired of it. We just wanted to win. Tired of losing in the third period,” Jake Middleton said. “Play 40 (minutes) hard and lose in the last 20. Sick and tired of that. So we accomplished

DENVER -- Yakov Trenin and Brock Faber scored 1:35 apart in the third period for the Minnesota Wild, who pulled away from the Colorado Avalanche for a 3-1 win at Ball Arena on Monday.

With a little over a minute left in the second period, Colorado star Nathan MacKinnon made the Wild look silly when he deked Trenin and tied the game with his 18th goal of the season. It came on just the Avalanche's 11th shot on goal in two periods.

After a bad loss to Nashville on Saturday, the Wild bounced back with a smart, structured game plan against the rival Avalanche.

The Avalanche lost 3-1 to the Minnesota Wild at Ball Arena on Monday. Nathan MacKinnon scored for Colorado while Mackenzie Blackwood made 23 saves inclduing two highlight-reel stops. Minnesota's Jake Middleton opened the scoring at 12:18 of the first period with a wrist shot through traffic from the point.