Sean Bergenheim was hi-sticked in the face by Nick Schultz at the seven minute mark. Florida won their first two faceoffs, keeping the puck in the Minnesota zone for the first 1:42 of the man advantage and collecting four shots on goal.
Devin Setoguchi ran over Jose Theodore at the 13 minute mark to put the Cats back up a man for two minutes. After just a few seconds, Mikael Samuelsson (8) finally got the Panthers on the board when he corraled a loose rebound in front of Niklas Backstrom and flipped it into the net. Tomas Fleischmann (26) and Stephen Weiss (29) collected assists on the play.
The Wild would score the equalizer with only 19 seconds remaining in the period. Kyle Brodziak (16) scored with assists from Marek Zidlicky (14) and Dany Heatley (24).
Hits: Wild, 23-21 (Jack Skille collected five hits for the Panthers, while Darroll Powe had six for the Wild).
Blocked Shots: Wild, 12-5 (Kyle Brodziak and Nate Prosser each had three for Minnesota).
Faceoffs: Panthers, 17-16 (Stephen Weiss won nine of 17 faceoff chances for Florida. Matt Cullen won five of 12 for the Wild).
Shots on Goal: Panthers, 24-19 (Mikael Samuelsson took five for the Cats, while Dany Heatley paced the Wild with four.)
Score: Panthers 1, Wild 1