Nashville, TN – The Nashville Predators ended their brief three game losing streak in the friendly confines of Bridgestone Arena tonight with a hard earned shootout win against the Minnesota Wild, 2-1.
With the win, Nashville extends their NHL points lead to 109 points.
The Predators were anxious to break the streak they were on and to avenge the loss on Saturday night to Minnesota, 4-1.
Roman Josi got the Predators off to an early 1-0 lead at 2:51 of the first period. It was a one-timer off the faceoff that blistered past Minnesota goalie, Devan Dubnyk.
Finally, as the Predators were trying to keep the puck and work the clock down in the third period, Eric Staal scored to even the game at 1-1. The goal came off of a pass from Mikael Granlund to Staal who then tipped the puck in for the game tying goal.
The teams then went into 3 on 3 overtime when Nashville’s Ryan Ellis scored the apparent game winning goal just 40 seconds into the extra time. It sent the Bridgestone Arena crowd screaming through the halls of the arena and filing out of their seats. In fact, the Predators were headed down the tunnel, when the officials called them back to the ice.
Minnesota had challenged the goal for being offside.
The play WAS deemed offside and the two teams resumed play.
At the end of overtime, the teams then went to a shootout, where Nashville’s Kyle Turris scored the only goal and the Predators had won, for the second time of the game.
This time it was official.
Predators goalie Pekka Rinne was stellar in goal with 22 saves, regaining his form that makes him the leading candidate to win the Vezina Trophy this season.
Nashville now prepares for what will be a very physical game on Thursday night against the visiting San Jose Sharks. Puck drops at 7:00pm.
