The sweep of the NHL from Saturday starts in Nashville, where the Predators hosted the St Louis Blues and sent them to a 5-0 defeat.
Filip Forsberg’s hat trick led Preds to win over Blues – file photo by Lewis Bleiman
Filip Forsberg scored his second hat trick in three games and Pekka Rinne (28 saves) picked up the shutout, his fourth of the campaign.
“I’m just trying to shoot everything I guess,” Forsberg said. “Obviously [Predators forward Mike Ribeiro] made a few really nice plays, [Predators forward Craig Smith] made a great drop play there too. I’m just trying to get open I guess is the biggest thing.
“We’ve really found a way to play defensively. I think that’s the biggest key in all of this. That’s the biggest thing to get offense too. I think we’re playing really solid defensively, and our goalies are coming up with big saves when we need them too.”
It was a natural hat trick for Forsberg.
“A lot of times you have great confidence,” Predators coach Peter Laviolette said. “A lot of our guys do right now. There’s quite a few guys that are playing with a lot of confidence. [Rinne] has got a lot of confidence, Craig Smith, Mike Ribeiro, but [Forsberg] really seems to be dialed in right now. He’s moving quickly, he’s moving the puck quickly, getting his shot off quick, and all of that is translating to offense.”
The Blues have now lost three straight, all in regulation for the first time this season and they offense is fading.
“Anytime something like this happens, it [stinks],” Blues defenseman Jay Bouwmeester said. “It happens to everybody. In the third period, we did some good things. We had some chances. That’s what we were trying to do and just get some momentum heading home. When you play two games, you know it’s not going to be perfect.”
The injuries seem to be taking a toll.
In Calgary, the Ottawa Senators got a natural hat trick from Mika Zibanejad in the third period, in a span of 2:38, to help the Sens douse the Flames, 6-4.
“We really needed this one,” Zibanejad said. “We talked about it before we went out there in the third. We talked about how important this game was for us. We really needed this win. We had to win. It’s nice to come out with two points here.”
Craig Anderson back-stopped Sens past Flames – file photo by Brent Clark
Zack Smith, Nick Paul and Jean-Gabriel Pageau also scored for Ottawa.
“The pucks went in today,” Zibanejad said. “I’ve been struggling a little bit with that lately. It’s always nice to see the first one go in. I didn’t know it went in at first. I saw the reply. After that, I don’t know … the rest came pretty much to my stick. It was nice.”
Craig Anderson made 34 saves for the win.
“He (Zibanejad) did a great job,” Senators captain Erik Karlsson said. “He deserves those bounces. He’s been putting himself in situations throughout a number of games now without getting anything for it. It’s just been keeping doing the same thing and eventually they’re going to go in. He’s a good player and has a good shot. That happened to him today. He fought and was in the right spot at the right time. That’s three goals for him which we needed at the right time.”
Johnny Gaudreau scored twice and Joe Colborne and Sean Monahan added goals for the Flames.
“There’s some good effort throughout the game,” Gaudreau said. “But you need to play a full 60 minutes.”
In Dallas, the Stars hosted the New York Rangers and could not seem to over the hump and score a go-ahead goal.
On the flip side, the Rangers scored three go-ahead goals and the final one made the difference in a 3-2 win.
“You’re not going to stop those guys. They’re going to get some looks, they’re going to get some chances,” Rangers coach Alain Vigneault said. “We tried obviously to have two lines and four [defensemen] because we knew they’d play a lot, a lot of minutes and a lot of big minutes. I thought we did as good of a job as you can against such elite players.”
Kevin Klein scored with under four minutes left in regulation to give the Rangers the win.
Henrik Lundqvist helped Rangers edge Blues – file photo by Lewis Bleiman
“I think we played a pretty solid game,” Rangers defenseman Dan Girardi said. “We played a pretty solid game against really one of the best teams in the West. I was real happy with getting both these games [at St. Louis and Dallas] on this road trip here.”
Henrik Lundqvist made 36 saves for the Rangers win.
“I love the way we’ve been playing the last two games, the way we’ve been competing. It really gets me going too,” Lundqvist said. “I get excited when I see the guys play that hard for the group, and it shows a lot of good things for his group moving forward.”
Chris Kreider and Ryan McDonagh also scored for the Rangers who did not yield a power play to the Stars for the entire game.
“I thought we had a couple tough turnovers at different times, but I thought our compete [level] and our battle [level], our chances of not giving up the rush plays, were good,” Stars coach Lindy Ruff said. “Our tracking back and our backchecking were probably the best they’ve been in a long time. It was a game we could have easily won.”
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