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A Win is a Win

December 29, 2011, 8:48 AM ET [ Comments]
Paul McCann
Nashville Predators Blogger •Predators Radio Network • RSSArchiveCONTACT
It wasn’t the most exciting game, but the Nashville Predators will certainly take the two points as they defeated the Minnesota Wild 2-1 in a shootout in front of the team’s fifth consecutive sellout. Let’s face it, Pred/Wild games are rarely high flying, high scoring affairs. Last night was no exception, in an eerie similarity to the St. Louis game two weeks ago, the game featured a third period goal, followed by a critical third period breakdown, followed by a shootout win.

With seven minutes gone in the third, Jonathan Blum… make that Jordin Tootoo, put the team up 1-0 on a nice shot from the point, Nashville let down and allowed a scrum in front of the net that led to Dany Heatley’s game tying goal with less than four minutes remaining in the game. Uncharacteristic for the Preds, but you could call it understandable, especially considering the makeup of the Preds blueline, almost every error (and there were not many) was taken care of by the outstanding play of Pekka Rinne. Rinne came very close to keeping the game in regulation with a great play on Heatley, but the puck managed to barely squeeze by Rinne’s skate and into the net.

Nashville started three rookies on defense last night, Blum, Roman Josi and Ryan Ellis. All comported themselves well. Add in rookies Craig Smith and Gabriel Bourque and you have quite possibly the youngest lineup in the league. Speaking of Bourque, he also looked good in his first NHL action, adding even more speed and good hands to the lineup. Post game, Preds coach Barry Trotz said that if Bourque continues to play this way, he could be with the big club for “quite some time.”

The Preds travel to St. Louis today for tomorrow night’s match up with the Blues.

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Random Notes

- The Preds finished December 6-3-0 at home, raising their home record to 10-6-3 for the season.

- Preds prospect Mikkaa Salomaki scored in Team Finland’s 4-1 dismantling of Team USA yesterday in the WJC.

- Last night’s win put the Predators alone at the 7 spot in the West, one point ahead of Dallas and LA, four points behind Minnesota and St. Louis.

- The race in the Central mirrors the tight conference standings. Nashville is 7-3-0 in their last ten and has not been able to make a move in the division race… Why? Because Detroit has also gone 7-3-0, Chicago and St. Louis have gone 7-2-1.

- Since I couldn’t catch last night’s 24/7, I have been avoiding Twitter like the plague so I don’t get any spoilers…

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