Predators maul Avs, 5-1 Saros continues to make a case for remaining in Nashville

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In Nashville, the Predators rolled through the visiting Colorado Avalanche on Saturday with a three-goal third period en route to a 5-1 win.

Cody Glass hit for first career NHL hat trick in the win.

It was the eighth straight victory for the Preds who are charging up the standings ladder in the Western Conference.

“It was unbelievable,” Glass said. “I was saying before that I think [my teammates] wanted it more than I did. I didn’t want to put any pressure on myself. I was just trying to do what I was doing the whole game. They were trying to find me the whole time. We have a great team here. To be on an eight-game winning streak, everybody is pulling on the same rope.”

The Preds improved to 35-25-2.

Juuse Saros made 25 saves in the win’ not so trade-able now, right?.

“I just liked our relentlessness,” Nashville coach Andrew Brunette said. “I think we’re connected. We’re taking away time and space at a high level right now, and that comes from work ethic. It comes from trust, and that comes from being connected and kind of all pulling the same rope.

“We understand where we are, we understand what we’re doing, and we’re having fun doing it. It’s been a great run and well-deserved.”

Glass picked up his first of the match at 15:18 of the opening stanza for a 1-0 lead to the Predators.

“This whole year, battling the injuries and getting healthy and seeing how hard [Glass] has worked to overcome that, he’s a huge reason why we won tonight,” Nashville’s Ryan O’Reilly said. “The timely goals were massive, and it’s great to see him get rewarded for it. It’s definitely well-deserved.”

Colorado replied with a goal from Nathan MacKinnon at 17:01 to make it 1-1 headed to the middle frame.

“I think they played good and deserved to win tonight,” the Avalanche’s Ryan Johansen said. “We just needed more to get past [Saros] and get on the board. It was a good game until early in the third there and they extended their lead. It was a fun game to play.”

The Avalanche dropped to 37-20-5.

“I thought we were competitive, played a hard, really good game for 40 minutes,” Colorado coach Jared Bednar said. “But I’d say the third period, it’s like they got better and we got worse in the third.

“Our breakouts, just the whole deal, we couldn’t deliver the puck to get us out of our own zone and into the neutral zone with any sort of flow.”

In the middle frame, Glass potted his double at 14:26 to reclaim the lead, 2-1, for the Predators.

“I think I was just finding the right areas,” Glass said. “Scorers go through different phases of different things during a season. Sometimes you find the open areas, and sometimes you don’t. Today I just felt like I was finding those open areas. I had really good passes on all three goals, so I can’t take credit for all of it.”

In the third period, Nashville put the game away with three strikes.

O’Reilly struck first with a power play goal at 9:46 of the frame for a 3-1 lead.

Tommy Novak added another power play marker, this one at 17:32 for a 4-1 advantage to Nashville.

Glass collected his hats with 52 seconds left in the game with an empty-net strike for the 5-1 final count on the scoreboard.

“We’ve got 20 games left here to get ourselves ready for how we want to play and how we need to play to be successful,” Johansen said. “We’ll just move on to the next one here and do better next game.”

Alexandar Georgiev made 30 saves in the loss.