SAINT PAUL, Minnesota (Reuters) - The Minnesota Wild got the best of Olympic goaltender Roberto Luongo for a second straight meeting by pouring on five goals in a 6-2 victory over the Vancouver Canucks on Sunday.
Guillaume Latendresse notched his 20th goal of the season in the first period, Kyle Brodziak and Marek Zidlicky scored in the second and Minnesota took a 3-0 lead en route to snapping a two-game slide.
Andrew Brunette and Cal Clutterbuck both added power play goals in the third where newly acquired Cam Barker also scored for the Wild (30-27-4) in his first game since being traded from the Chicago Blackhawks.
Vancouver's Mason Raymond netted a slap shot at 4:02 in the third that made it 3-1, and, following two Minnesota goals, Mikael Samuelsson added the final score for the visitors with 10:21 to play.
"If teams want to take liberties and unnecessary penalties and retaliatory penalties, that's where your power play has got to step up," Wild coach Todd Richards told reporters.
For the Canucks (37-22-2), it was the eighth contest of their record 14-game road trip brought on by the Winter Games occupying their home. Sunday marks the final day of games before the NHL breaks until March 1.
The loss kept the Canucks tied with the Colorado Avalanche atop the Northwest Division.
"You could see that we weren't really ready to play," said defenseman Sami Salo. "They made some good plays and scored some nice goals, and we couldn't get going at any point in the game."
Set to represent Canada in the Vancouver Olympics, Luongo was chased at 8:04 in the third period after also getting the early hook on January 13 in a 5-2 defeat to the Wild. Luongo had been playing well and was coming off a shutout against the Florida Panthers on Thursday.
(Writing by Jahmal Corner in Los Angeles; Editing by John Mehaffey/Ian Ransom)
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