The Tampa Bay Lighting continue to have issues gaining any traction and ended a five-game homestand with a 2-2-1 record after a dreadful 6-1 to the Nashville Predators Thursday.
Colton Sissons had a hat trick for the Preds who improved to 17-14-7 with their fourth straight road win.
Goalie Pekka Rinne (#35) – picked up the win Tampa – file photo by Lewis Bleiman
“It’s kind of surreal right now,” Sissons said. “I’ve been struggling to find the back of the net just in general, so to [score] three [Thursday] feels pretty good.”
Tyler Johnson scored the lone goal for the Bolts who fell to 19-17-4 on the campaign.
“We defended, we worked, we had 70 shot attempts at the net,” Tampa Bay coach Jon Cooper said. “We didn’t give them much the whole night. They had 24 blocked shots. That’s a lot. But when you wake up in the morning the score is going to say 6-1.”
Mike Fisher, Filip Forsberg and Ryan Ellis also scored for Nashville.
“I liked the fact that we came out and played hard,” Nashville coach Peter Laviolette said. “There were games on the road that I thought we played OK and didn’t get the results we were looking for. It’s nice to start getting some road wins; we’ve got to get that record back up.”
Pekka Rinne had 27 saves in the win.
“Actually [Sissons] got rewarded for all the hard work he’s put in. He’s not one of those guys that you see in the score sheet, but he’s one of those guys that shows up every night, works hard and battles for the club. So it’s really fun for him and the team to see that hat trick,” Forsberg said of Sissons’ effort for Nashville and the hat trick.
WATCH: All Predators vs. Lightning highlights
Andrei Vasilevskiy faced only 18 shots in the loss and stopped 13.
“I don’t think it was a lack of execution, I think effort was there tonight and it’s just one of those games where the puck goes into your net and you can’t find a way to score,” Tampa’s Victor Hedman said after the home loss. “So I definitely don’t think it was a 6-1 game, it’s kind of a tough one to explain, but we have to take the effort with us. We have a big road trip coming up and we have to get points. We have to forget about the result and take what was positive out of this game.”
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