There is no place like home for the Nashville Predators.
On Thursday night the Preds’ Pekka Rinne made 19 saves for his fifth shutout of the season and second straight as he beat the Los Angeles Kings, 5-0.
“I’ll take that any given day,” Rinne said. “That’s a really solid game by us, solid defensively, solid offensively. Of course, sometimes it’s nice to face a lot of shots and feel good, but I’ll take this game any given day. I think it was 19 shots and not busy at all. It was perfect. It was fun to watch.”
Filip Forsberg had a goal in his return to the lineup.
“I think we’ve been a great team all year, to be honest with you, with missing guys almost all the time and still managing to put up a lot of points and win a lot of games,” Forsberg said. “I’m excited going forward.”
Nashville improved to 30-12-7.
Craig Smith and Calle Jarnkrok helped build a 3-0 first period lead for Nashville.
“Start to finish, I thought we dictated the pace of the game,” Ryan Johansen said s. “Everyone on our club was going tonight, and it’s a good feeling when we’re all on the same page because we’re a great hockey team. We’re going to keep looking to play like we did tonight now.”
Colton Sissons scored in the second period and Viktor Arvidsson struck midway through the third period to close out the scoring.
“I think we all have a lot of confidence in each other, and we know the potential and the skill we have in this locker room. I think we have to expect that from us every single night,” Rinne said. ” I feel like the results have been there for us, but I think that our level of play has been up and down. It’s a good sign that we’re still winning games, but tonight was the total opposite.
“We were dominating all 60 minutes and played a really solid game. I think this is obviously a step in the right direction and hopefully we can continue from here. I really liked the way we played.”
[WATCH: All Kings vs. Predators highlights]
Jonathan Quick made 31 saves
“We ended up chasing the puck and not getting in tough areas and allowing them to get in a lot of tough areas,” Kings head coach John Stevens said. “That’s what happens when you lose a lot of puck battles. It was probably the mirror opposite of what we did [Tuesday] night [in a 3-0 win at the Dallas Stars]. They did it to us. We better learn from it. You’re not going to beat good teams when you lose puck battles to that degree.”
You must be logged in to post a comment.