In the sweep of the NHL from Friday night, we start in Columbus, where the Blue Jackets rode a 32-save effort from Sergei Bobrovsky to defeat the Chicago Blackhawks, 3-2, for their first win of the season.
“He’s played outstanding the first two games for us,” Columbus captain Nick Foligno said of Bobrovsky. “It’s nice to reward him with a win.”
Foligno, Zach Werenski and William Karlsson scored for the Jackets in the win that certainly released some pressure off the bench and their coach John Tortorella.
Columbus built a strong opening period where they outshot the Hawks, 17-10 and led 1-0 on the strength of Werenski’s goal.
“That was our best period of the game, probably our best period of the season so far. We skated. We played north-south. We created some opportunities,” Tortorella said after the game.
Secondary players are scoring for Chicago and Friday was no different with Tyler Motte, and Richard Panik picking up the goals. For Panik it was his fifth on the year.
Corey Crawford took the loss on 25 saves.
In Detroit, five different skaters scored for the Red Wings in a 5-3 win over the Nashville Predators.
Detroit got goals from Justin Abdelkader, Drew Miller, Tomas Tatar, Gustav Nyquist, and Darren Helm.
“I thought we had a lot of guys playing,” Red Wings coach Jeff Blashill said. “We did a lot of good things, and the only time we got into trouble was with puck management in our own zone.”
Petr Mrazek had 30 saves for the win.
Special teams were working for the Preds as their goals all came on the power play from P.K. Subban, Mike Ribeiro and Mike Fisher.
“Both teams were forechecking hard and creating chances, but they were faster than we were and they moved the puck better than we did,” Fisher said.
Pekka Rinne took the loss on 38 saves.
“I thought we played hard, especially with a short bench,” coach Peter Laviolette said. “We just shot ourselves in the foot too many times. You can’t make that many mistakes in a close game.”
In Brooklyn, the New York Islanders edged the Arizona Coyotes, 3-2.
Johnny Boychuk scored shorthanded to give the Isles the game-winner in the third period.
“It was big for us,” Islanders head coach Jack Capuano said. “The way the NHL is now and the way the game is played, you’ve got four-man attacks, you’ve got five-man attacks. There are guys that are maybe a little bit out of their comfort zone playing the way that we want to play, but it’s paying dividends for us, for sure.”
Dennis Seidenberg and Ryan Strome also scored for the Isles and Jaroslav Halak made 23 saves to grab the win.
The Coyotes fell to 1-3-0 on the season.
“We’ve got to keep pounding away at it,” Arizona coach Dave Tippett said. “We’re learning a lot about our team right now, not just young players, but all our new players and where the parts fit. Obviously, we’ve got to do a better job of executing to give ourselves a better chance to win.”
Brad Richardson and Radim Vrbata scored for Arizona and Louis Domingue made 28 saves in the loss.
“Obviously, I want more. I want to win. It’s not enough, it’s never enough. We’ve got to keep trying to find ways and take some wins here. It’s a tough start to the year. We’ve got to turn it around real quickly,” Domingue said on the loss.
You must be logged in to post a comment.