Nashville thump Chicago, 6-1

In Nashville, the Predators scored twice off the power play in building a 5-0 lead on Saturday afternoon over the Chicago Blackhawks.

Nashville went on for a 6-1 win.

“I think we did have some opportunistic scoring,” Nashville head coach John Hynes said. “I personally thought Chicago played pretty well and pretty hard. Tonight we were fortunate where we didn’t necessarily play the game we want to play to give ourselves a ton of success, but we were able to score at the right times, and sometimes that’s how the game goes.”

Juuse Saros made 37 saves in the Preds win.

Philipp Kurashev scored the Blackhawks only goal.

“I was like, `Guys are ready to play,'” Blackhawks head coach Derek King said. “They were buzzing around. We had puck possession.

“I didn’t think we played a really bad game. I liked our start. We had opportunities. We just couldn’t bury them. They had opportunities and they scored.”

Nashville improved to 20-11-2.

Tanner Jeannot hit for a pair goals for Nashville.

Chicago dropped to 11-16-4.

Nashville’s offense got on a roll and had strikes from Filip Forsberg, Ryan Johansen, Nick Cousins, and Jeannot.

“That’s obviously the way you want to start the period,” Jeannot said. “We had kind of a mindset to get on them quick and start setting the pace, setting the tone with our style of hockey.”

Roman Josi pushed the advantage to 5-0 before the Blackhawks got on the board.

Jeannot added his second strike with 53 seconds gone in the third period for the 6-1 final.

“I think the thing that’s really impressive is not so much the fact he has the 10 goals to this point, but just the consistency level he’s playing with,” Hynes said, “and him playing to his own personal identity as a real strong power forward that can score. As long as he continues to do that, I don’t see why the success wouldn’t continue to come.”

Collin Delia got the start for Chicago and surrendered five goals and made two saves before being given the hook.

Arvid Soderblom made 15 saves in a mop up role.

“It was fun to play,” Soderblom said. “I’ve dreamed about playing in the NHL [since] I was a kid. It was fun, but a tough game. I feel like I played pretty good, did a couple of good saves.”