The last thing the Minnesota Wild can afford is another injury to another major player. That nightmare scenario almost came true in Game 3 when Matt Boldy left in the first period after taking what appeared to be a cheap shot from Jamie Benn.
Already the Wild are without both Mats Zuccarello and Yakov Trenin after they were taken out, and Marcus Foligno left Game 3 with a bloody nose and face after Matt Duchene slammed his head into the ice on a play that was deemed accidental contact.
Benn, who has a history of nefarious behavior on the ice, took Boldy out with a blow to the back of his head. In real time it looked sketchy -- perhaps through the biased eyes of Wild fans -- but it wasn't just those in Minnesota who objected to the hit.
Jamie Benn takes out Matt Boldy. No surprise pic.twitter.com/YOk2qHilu1
— 10,000 Takes (@10k_Takes) April 23, 2026
TNT's intermission report crew argued about the hit for two periods, first with Paul Bissonnette defending Benn before Henrik Lundqvist stopped him with some pushback.
Henrik Lundqvist sides with Wild fans over Jamie Benn's hit on Matt Boldy in Game 3
"His hand is coming down a little bit. He's jumping up but his hand comes down as Boldy's getting up," Lundqvist argued. "I'm not that convinced [it was unintentional]. I'm like 60 percent that he did it on purpose."
"[Benn] has been all over him all series. There's a couple of clips from the games in Dallas," Biz said. "And let's be honest, he doesn't have the best track record going either. It's hard to pin that on him given the fact that wasn't making eye contact with him off the hop. He tried to jump to avoid it."
"He jumped up but his hand came down," Lundqvist countered.
It's a bit more on the fence than Biz is arguing, and he's right about his comment that Wild fans will love Lundqvist more after hearing his counterargument. Dallas has been proven to play ugly hockey in the past and has already decided to play cheap in an effort to bait the Wild into dumb penalties -- a strategy that is unfortunately working.
Perhaps the best counter came from Boldy himself, though. While he sat for the remainder of the first period, he returned to both score a goal that tie the game and be on the ice for Michael McCarron's goal to take the lead.
Boldy is one of the Wild's most important players -- something Dallas already knows but also quickly learned the hard way affter poking the bear.
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