The Nashville Predators exploded for three goals in the third period last night, blowing open what was a fairly tight game against Minnesota in their sixth straight victory, a 5-1 drubbing of the Wild. It had to be a satisfying win for a lot of folks involved with the organization, a win over a team chasing them, a win over the old owner’s team, with that owner in attendance.

I have to honest here, I like Craig Leipold, I’m not one of those people who dog him for what happened a few years back. Leipold is a main reason hockey is in Nashville, and he is the reason hockey remained in Nashville during the whole bout of Balsilliness in 2007. He could’ve taken the crazy money on the table and ran, but he didn’t want Nashville to lose this team, so he took almost $30 million dollars less to sell to the local ownership group… for that alone, Pred Nation should be thankful. We may not like that it happened, but we can certainly look back and see that because of what happened, we now have a more stable and more secure franchise.

So… the win streak is now at six. The team practices this morning then takes off for South Florida for a Thursday night tilt against the Panthers before coming back to face Chicago on Saturday. Florida is coming off an overtime wins over Washington and Thursday’s contest is the second of a six game homestand for them. Look up "trap game" and you may see this game as the definition for Nashville.

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Congratulations to Shea Weber on his second consecutive selection as an NHL All-Star.

Not to get picky here but… five goaltenders from the Eastern Conference? Really? Sorry… makes no sense that the weaker conference dominates in this way. I was up for this experiment in not having the conference vs. conference format in the All-Star Game… not any more. It seems to give the overexposed eastern teams even more exposure and the lesser exposed western teams even less.

When looking at the goaltending leaders of the league there are three goaltenders listed on both Save % and Goals Against Average… Tim Thomas, Pekka Rinne and Semyon Varlamov… and only one of these goaltenders was selected. The top rookie goaltender in the league by stats? Anders Lindback… not invited.

James Mirtle is today’s Globe and Mail makes a very weak defense of the NHL’s selections, using number of wins as the primary ranking point. Sure it’s one way of looking at it… looking at it that way, Jimmy Howard should be a hands down selection, but that shouldn’t be the only criteria. When you dig into the numbers… both Pekka Rinne and Anders Lindback deserve to be included.

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Random Notes

- The Predators announced a new corporate partner in Fifth Third Bank today. The bank will partner with the team and Bridgestone Arena. More good news on the business front out of Smashville.

- Looks like Toronto is trying to follow the Preds model… after beating LA, the Leafs took out San Jose last night. It was Ron Wilson’s 600th career coaching win.

- Stephane Auger was one of the refs in last night’s Canucks/Islanders game… no real issues to speak of for the reunion of Auger with Canuck forward Alex Burrows after last year’s controversy.

- The Western Conference shuffle continues as Nashville, Phoenix and Colorado attempt to put some separation into the race. The reeling Columbus Blue Jackets and the flickering Calgary Flames are at risk of falling out of contention. The Predators have actually managed to put a little distance between the pack at the 9-10-11 spot as last night’s win opened up a 5 point lead on LA, Minny and San Jose.

- The All-Star Game jerseys were revealed yesterday… I kinda like ‘em. At least they look like hockey sweaters… unlike some past ones.

- Is it time to blow up the Blue Jackets? That is the question Joe Yerdon is asking on the NBC Sports hockey blog PHT. He has some rather interesting ideas on the situation in C-bus.

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You are invited to follow me on Twitter. Search for @PredPAPaul… Not only will I be updating when I get news or updates, but we are having a bit of fun by getting your input on Gnash introductions, weigh in on Twitter and who knows, we may use your introduction for the best mascot in the NHL at the next Preds game!

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COMING UP ON THE NEXT SLAPSHOT RADIO…

Tonight - We will have a roundtable discussion on the Predators at midseason with Terry Crisp and Tom Callahan, we preview the NCAA game between UAH and Merrimack College coming to the Bridge with the head coach of the UAH Chargers, Chris Luongo. We’ll also take a look at the Predators-Panthers game with Florida radio play-by-play man Randy Moller. It’s all on tonight’s SlapShot Radio, 6pm Central on SportsRadio 560 WNSR or listen online at www.slapshotradio.com

For the most updated guest information go to the SlapShot Radio website.

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