By PATRICK DONNELLY

ST. PAUL, Minn. — Kurtis MacDermid scored the winning goal early in the third period and the Colorado Avalanche held on to defeat the Minnesota Wild 3-2 on Friday night.

Ross Colton and Valeri Nichushkin also scored for the Avalanche, who have won five of their last six games

Alexandar Georgiev stopped 19 of 21 shots.

Kirill Kaprizov and Joel Eriksson Ek scored and Filip Gustavsson made 23 saves for the Wild, who are 0-4-2 in their last six games.

MacDermid took a pass from Andrew Cogliano in the slot, deked Gustavsson and tucked it home on the backhand for his first goal of the season.

Nichushkin’s power-play goal, a redirection of Nathan MacKinnon ‘sslap shot, gave Colorado a 2-0 lead at 8:39 of the second period.

But just 34 seconds later, Kaprizov’s tip trickled through Georgiev’s pads to put the Wild on the board.

Minnesota tied it on Eriksson Ek’s power-play goal five minutes later.

The Wild were playing for the first time since returning from a trip to Sweden, where they earned one point in two games against Ottawa and Toronto.

Much of the drama in the leadup to Friday’s game involved Wild goalie Marc-Andre Fleury, who was cautioned by the NHL not to wear a specially designed mask for the team’s Native American Heritage night. Fleury ignored the league’s warning and wore the mask during the team’s pregame warmups.

Also before the game, the Avalanche announced that defenseman Samuel Girard would be away from the team indefinitely seeking treatment from the NHL/NHLPA Player Assistance Program. Girard said anxiety and depression led to alcohol abuse.

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AP NHL: https://apnews.com/hub/nhl

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