In Nashville, Jusse Saros made 38 saves on Monday night and the Predators downed the Calgary Flames, 2-1.
“It was huge,” said Nashville’s Roman Josi. “Just when you look at the standings, [the Flames] are obviously in front of us, a couple points, and it was a big game for us too. Kind of a four-point game, so it was definitely a big win for us.”
The Preds improved to 20-17-6.
“That’s a sign of good things to come, right, when you’re able to do that,” Nashville coach John Hynes said. “That’s what we’ve talked about with [Parssinen] for a while. He’s got a really strong game. He’s a mentally tough kid. I think he’s got the physical ability to play at this level night in and night out.
“He’s done a really good job. That’s good to see, a good, young player with good offensive instincts and good offensive upside.”
Josi and Juuso Parssinen scored in the opening period to give the Predators a 2-0 lead.
“I thought the first [period] was really good,” Josi said. “I felt like we had a lot of chances. They didn’t get much.”
Calgary’s Nikita Zadorov scored late in the middle frame to cut the Preds’ lead in half at 2-1.
“It was a pathetic effort by us the first two periods for sure,” Zadorov said. “We were a step behind. The energy wasn’t there, the commitment wasn’t there, we weren’t shooting. We were making bad plays, giving up too many chances, so I think it was just an all-around bad effort for us in the first two periods.”
Calgary dropped to 21-15-9.
“[Saros] was huge,” Josi said. “It doesn’t matter how we play. He always keeps us in games. We’re always in a game. If we do a good job in front of him, playing good defensively, we have a really good chance to win any game with him in there.”
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Jacob Markstrom made 27 saves in the Flames loss.
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