The Minnesota Wild have won their first playoff series since 2015, eliminating the Dallas Stars in Game 6 Thursday night, 5-2.The Stars kept up with Minnesota for most of the game as Quinn Hughes and Vladimir Tarasenko scored the first two goals for the Wild.

The Quinn Hughes trade gave the Minnesota Wild unprecedented optimism heading into the postseason. Finally, the team had the big-name starpower to take on all comers, or at least, in theory. There was still the tricky matter of,

Quinn Hughes scores two in his three point night for a 5-2 win over Dallas to win the series 4-2.

The fans flowed out of Grand Casino Arena on Thursday ready to celebrate. They should. They’ve earned a playoff run, just like the players.

The Minnesota Wild are not known for being a beefy team. Their most important players include Kirill Kaprizov (5-foot-10), Quinn Hughes (5-foot-10), Jared Spurgeon (5-foot-9), and Mats Zuccarello (5-foot-8).

The Wild’s tree-planting initiative led St. Paul RiverCentre to create Trees for Travel. The program allows events at the Grand Casino Arena, St. Paul RiverCentre and Roy Wilkins Auditorium to offset attendees’ travel emissions by purchasing carbon credits from Green Cities Accord.

Two teams, two game sixes and the high stakes drove fans to hit the town on a school night.

The Minnesota Wild will try to eliminate the Dallas Stars from the NHL Playoffs Thursday night without Jonas Brodin.