It was not a successful return to Minnesota for Zach Parise and the New York Islanders on Sunday night.
The Islanders gave up four unanswered goals to the Wild in the third period as they dropped a 5-2 decision in Parise’s first game back in Minnesota as a visitor.
The Wild welcomed Parise back with a video tribute during the first period after he spent the previous nine seasons as a member of the Wild. He and Ryan Suter signed matching 13-year, $97 million contracts in free agency prior to the 2011-12 season but were both bought out by the team this past offseason, making them unrestricted free agents.
Suter signed a multi-year deal with the Dallas Stars while Parise signed a one-year deal with the Islanders..
Welcome back, Zach.#mnwild pic.twitter.com/qUdlpL2tQD
— Minnesota Wild (@mnwild) November 8, 2021
Parise scored 199 goals and 400 total points in his 558 regular season games with the team.
So far this season he has zero goals and two assists in his first 10 games with the Islanders.
As for the game itself, the Wild used a dominant third period to pull off another come-from-behind win, something that has became a habit for them this season. On Saturday night they erased a late two-goal deficit in Pittsburgh to get a 5-4 shootout win over the Penguins, and then rallied again on Sunday.
The Wild ended up outshooting the Islanders by a 39-21 margin for the game, including a commanding a 16-2 edge in the third period.
Minnesota entered the third trailing 2-1, until Ryan Hartman tied the game at the 7:17 mark of the period. Less than two minutes later Brandon Duhaime scored the eventual game-winning goal. The Wild added two empty net goals later in the period.
The Wild are now 8-3-0 on the season.
As for the Islanders, the loss snapped what had been a seven-game point streak (5-0-2) following an 0-2-0 start to the season.
Anders Lee scored both Islanders goals in the loss, while Semyon Varlamov made his first start of the season in goal. He played well for the most part, but did not get much help in front of him.
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Adam Gretz is a writer for Pro Hockey Talk on NBC Sports. Drop him a line at phtblog@nbcsports.com or follow him on Twitter @AGretz.