BOSTON — If the Boston Bruins do survive this brutal Eastern Conference race and make it to the playoffs, they got a taste of what it might be like on Saturday at TD Garden.

In a thoroughly entertaining game against a quality opponent, the B’s never trailed and then held off the supremely talented Minnesota Wild team to take two points in a 6-3 victory. It felt a lot closer than that at the end, though.

Both Pavel Zacha and Elias Lindholm scored two goals apiece and Jeremy Swayman made 32 saves for a terrific win.

The B’s will travel to Columbus to face the Blue Jackets on Sunday in yet another critical game.

In this one, the B’s held a lead for almost the entire game.

While they they spent a little more time in their own zone than they would have liked, the B’s played a good first period and took a 2-0 lead into the first intermission.

They didn’t wait to long to take the lead. The B’s had a good first shift, immediately hemming in the Wild. The B’s were in the midst of a change when David Pastrnak pushed the puck out to Andrew Peeke toward the top of the right circle. Peeke skated into it and, from just outside the dot, fired a perfectly placed shot over Filip Gustavsson’s blocker and just inside the far post at 1:01, the rugged defenseman’s fifth of the year.

Like the B’s, the Wild are one of the heavier teams in the league and there were signs of something coming at 6:22 when some pushing and shoving between the benches led to Tanner Jeannot and old friend Nick Foligno getting sent off for matching roughing penalties.

Then later in the period, Mark Kastelic didn’t like how 6-foot-6, 232-pound Michael McCarron lined up Hampus Lindholm behind the B’s net and they dropped the gloves in the slot in front of Swayman. After both players helmets got knocked off, Kastelic scored the knockdown with an overhand right.

The B’s then doubled the lead right off the defensive zone faceoff after the fight. Off the draw, Casey Mittelstadt gained control of the puck and sent a long pass up to Viktor Arvidsson, who had a 2-on-1 with Zacha. Arvidsson took it to the left dot and sent a perfect pass to Zacha for his 25th of the year.

Meanwhile, Swayman looked like he was very much still on his game. The Wild held a 13-9 shot advantage but the netminder turned aside all the Minnesota offerings in the first period.

Swayman got plenty busy at the start of the second when the Wild stormed the B’s zone. He barely got a piece of Ryan Hartman’s backdoor tap-in attempt and it skittered just wide, with Kastelic clearing it out of immediate trouble. But Minny kept it in the zone and Mats Zuccarello had Swayman down and an empty net behind him. But Swayman appeared to just get a piece of that as well and sent it over the net.

The B’s weathered that push and stretched the lead to 3-0 at 10:27 on an exhausting shift inside the Minnesota zone. In the midst of a change again, Pastrnak stepped on the ice and got the puck with some speed on the right wing. After faking the shot, Pastrnak fed Arvidsson for the one-timer. It was a knuckleball, but Gustavsson had bitten so hard on the fake that it managed to float to the back of the net for his 21st.

The B’s had several chances to extend the lead further but either Gustavsson made the save or the chance went wide.

Minnesota finally made good on one of their chances and got on the board at 14:46. Hartman sent a pass to Kirill Kaprizov on the right wing and Kaprizov did not need much space to beat Swayman high on the short side.

The B’s had to kill off their first penalty of the game after Fraser Minten took an offensive zone infraction but they were able to do it and took the two-goal lead into the third.

At 3:48 of the third, the B’s regained their three-goal lead. Off a neutral zone draw outside the Minnesota line, Morgan Geekie collected the puck in the O-zone and dished it back to Hampus, who fired it toward the net. It didn’t get through, but Lukas Reichel was there to send a short pass to Elias for a tap-in, his 15th.

But the B’s gave the Wild a chance to get back in the game in the hurry. After a long defensive zone shift, Nikita Zadorov took a holding penalty and, on the delayed call, Marat Khusnutdinov took a tripping penalty, giving the Wild a 5-on-3 for the full two minutes.

The B’s did a good job of killing it off but with 14 seconds left on the two-man advantage, Zuccarello scored on a screen shot at 7:57 to cut the lead to 4-2.

The B’s got their second power play at the 10:00 mark but while they threatened, they could not score.

And with 6:16 left in regulation, the Wild pulled to within one on a Hartman goal. In a scramble in front, Swayman made the initial stop but the puck popped in the air and Hartman batted it home.

At that point, the knuckles started to whiten on Causeway Street.

But the B’s pushed the lead back to two goals with 3:10 remaining. Zacha stole the puck from Quinn Hughes behind the Minnesota net and Mittelstadt collected the loose puck. He took it all the way out toward the blue line before firing it toward the net where Zacha was stationed to deflect home his 26th.

That finally broke the Wild and Elias finished it off with an empty-netter.

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