Playing their third road game in the past four nights on Tuesday, the Minnesota Wild at times looked like a team running on fumes. Then, they would get a boost of energy and refuse to fly back to Minnesota without a fight.

In the end, the Wild held an early lead, rallied to tie in the second and third periods but couldn’t finish off a sweep of their three-game road trip.

Cole Caufield scored with 15 seconds left in the third for the Montreal Canadiens, lifting them to a 4-3 win.

Vladimir Tarasenko scored twice and Brock Faber got a goal for Minnesota, which comes home for its next four games in St. Paul. The Wild got 29 saves from Jesper Wallstedt in the loss.

“Wally played great. Kept us in it all night,” said Faber. “They got a fast hockey team. Every single guy can skate and move. It’s hard to win here in this building. We didn’t have our best tonight, and like I said Wally kept us in it. I thought we pushed back well at times and gave ourselves a chance.”

The Wild looked discombobulated early and their hosts pounced, outshooting Minnesota 7-1 before the first period was half over.

The tide turned, briefly, when Faber was tripped, and Minnesota needed just 15 seconds of man advantage to take the lead. It was the fourth goal of the three-game road trip for Tarasenko and the 32nd time the Wild had scored first this season, which is tied with Washington for tops in the NHL.

But the Canadiens didn’t let it get them down, forging a tie on Phillip Danault’s first goal of the season, then treading a long range shot by Alexandre Carrier through a crowd in the final minute of the first to lead 2-1 after the first. Montreal outshot Minnesota 15-2 in the opening 20 minutes.

“They came out hot and ready, and we weathered the storm of it,” Wild coach John Hynes said. “We got some good goaltending early, but then I feel like our guys really dug in, and simplified the game, and, you know, got ourselves back competitively into the game, and that’s what you need to do.”

The middle frame wake-up call came at the right time for the Wild, who tied the score when a Faber shot from long range slipped through a screen provided by Vinnie Hinostroza at the net front. But the momentum disappeared quickly, as the Canadiens went up 3-2 on a goal by Lane Hutson barely two minutes after Faber’s tying goal to lead after two periods.

The Wild’s golden chance came with eight minutes left in the third, as consecutive penalties on the Habs gave Minnesota 45 seconds of a 5-on-3 power play. The Wild called a timeout to rest their top man-advantage unit, and Tarasenko squeezed in a shot from the goal line to knot the game once again.

“We had a slow start, and our goalie kept us in the game, gave us a chance to compete in the second and the third, and we got ourselves in the game,” Tarasenko said. “Some nights you lose a game, you have to take the lessons from this game and move on.”

Former Ohio State standout goalie Jakub Dobes had 16 saves for Montreal, which makes its lone trip to Minnesota this season on Feb. 2.

The Wild have confirmed they are shutting down Jonas Brodin because of a lingering lower-body injury, and that the defenseman won’t be playing for Sweden in the 2026 Winter Olympics next month.

Brodin missed his fourth straight game Tuesday.

Wild coach John Hynes, who will serve as an assistant coach for Team USA at the Milan Cortina Games, confirmed a published report that Brodin is being shut down and will not play in Italy.

Brodin has three goals and 12 assists in 42 games this season. Wild center Joel Eriksson Ek also is missing time with an injury, but Hynes said he was hoping he may get some good news when the team returns to Minnesota.

With both Wild goalies, Filip Gustavsson and Jesper Wallstedt, headed overseas to play in Milan Cortina, there is still a sense that the Swedes will be in the thick of the fight, although they also are likely to be without Ducks forward Leo Carlsson, also with a lower body injury.

Another Swedish standout, Maple Leafs forward William Nylander, missed Monday’s loss to the Wild and his Olympic status is unknown.

“I know all the treatment guys around every team here in the NHL is so good that hopefully they can get them back in shape and go there,” Gustavsson said after beating the Maple Leafs on Monday. “If it happens they can’t be there, Sweden’s got a lot of good players in the NHL. We’re going to be just fine.”

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