It was a night of rebounds in the three-game sweep of the NHL from Thursday night. In Tampa, the Nashville Predators continued their rebound from a dreadful stretch with a solid 3-2 win over the host Lightning.
Ben Bishop was chased in the game after giving up three goals on 11 shots.
Mike Ribeiro, Paul Gaustad and Mike Santorelli scored for the Preds.
Pekka Rinne held off the Bolts for Preds win in Tampa – file photo by Lewis Bleiman
“It wasn’t our best effort, that’s no secret,” Predators center Mike Fisher said. “But any time you can come into this building against a great team and get two points, you know that’s a great sign. We didn’t really generate a ton offensively, but we [scored] when we needed to.”
It was a rare off night for Bishop.
“It was just one of those games, first one goes off Ribeiro’s leg and into the five-hole; second one gets swatted out of the air – that stuff happens,” Bishop said. “If that’s the way teams have to beat you – by getting lucky bounces – it happens. I thought it was a great homestand, now, we got to go do it on the road.”
Pekka Rinne made 28 saves for the win.
“We got a little bit fortunate with our first two goals,” Rinne said. “First couple shots went in, maybe we weren’t quite as good as them at the first half of the game but I thought we got better. It’s not by accident they have the best home record, they seem to be going really hard and on top of their game.”
Despite the poor early showing the Bolts did respond but it was not enough.
“Ben [Bishop] has been unreal for us,” Lightning coach Jon Cooper said. “Would he like to have some of those back? There’s no question, but would we have liked not to turn the puck over on the first one? Yes. We had our chances. Maybe we deserved a little bit of a better fate. But when we played Florida [Panthers] the other night, they’re sitting there saying ‘we deserved a little bit of a better fate’. Tonight it was reversed. It happens.”
The second rebound of the night was in Ottawa where the New York Rangers needed a better performance against the Senators than they had against the Los Angeles Kings earlier this week.
And they got it.
Cam Talbot got the win over Sens – file photo by Lewis Bleiman
Chris Kreider scored twice and had three points on the night and Cam Talbot made 23 saves for the win.
“It’s definitely something we talked about,” said Kreider, who has 20 goals. “Lately, our starts have been pretty good, but after our start the other night, we kind of dropped off a bit and didn’t play Rangers hockey. It’s good to see a consistent effort from start to finish.
“I’m happy we clinched, and now we’ll try and get home ice.”
Dan Boyle, Mats Zuccarello and Tanner Glass added goals for New York, who clinched a playoff spot with the win.
“It’s visibly noticeable when (Kreider’s) going the way he is going,” said Rangers center Derek Stepan. “He’s all over pucks. He’s the fastest guy on the ice. He’s playing a real strong game. I thought he did a really good job tonight of doing that early.”
It was Andrew Hammond’s first regulation loss since taking over the net for the Sens.
We didn’t. Like any goalie, hot or not, veteran or rookie, (get) pucks (on net),” Kreider said. “You can’t score if you don’t shoot.
“We hadn’t heard all that much (about Hammond). We heard they had been hot recently. We hadn’t heard much about the goalie in particular. The only thing we had really heard was they were throwing hamburgers on the ice after games. That was the extent of it. Your approach doesn’t change regardless of who you’re playing. That’s the professional mentality.”
The third rebound of the night was also a visitor as the Colorado Avalanche went into Vancouver and defeated the Canucks, 4-1.
The Avs are desperate for points and they picked up two precious standings points with the win.
“Absolutely it could have been [easy to quit],” said captain Gabriel Landeskog. “But this team has shown enough character and perseverance that we are not going to quit.”
Reto Berra made 33 saves for the Avs in the win.
“We’re going to leave it all out there the last eight games,” Landeskog said. “It doesn’t matter where we are in the standings. We play for pride and we play for each other and we play for the crest on our jersey and we feel we owe it to each other in here.”
It was not a good game for the Canucks who knew the Los Angeles Kings had won in Uniondale earlier in the evening.
“It’s unacceptable,” defenseman Luca Sbisa said. “We knew how important this game was. Every game going down the stretch is going to be like a playoff game. Not showing up tonight is not acceptable. It’s pretty much like our ‘B’ team showed up. It’s not the same team as we’ve had the last three or four games.”
The Canucks will need a rebound of their own this weekend.
“Bottom line, we didn’t play well enough,” said goalie Eddie Lack, who made 18 of his 34 saves in the first period. “I can’t really point to why. The locker room felt good before. I felt like we were ready and then we weren’t.”
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