In a rare visit to the Sommet Center by the Montreal Canadiens, the home fans were treated to a record breaking Nashville performance. 55 shots on goal later and the 15,604 in attendance went home having witnessed a 2-0 win over the historic Habs.
Felder’s FANTASTIC Five:
1. Shots and shots and shots and shots - Most importantly, they were all on net… all 55 OF THEM. That's right, the Predators set a franchise record with the shots on goal this evening. You have to give credit to Carey Price for stopping 53 of said shots. I thought he was the lone bright stop for Montreal, despite how shaky he was whenever the puck bounced off the end boards. All but one Nashville Predator (not including Peks of course) had a shot on goal. Ryan Suter was the lone man, but his buds more than made up for it. 11 SOG for Sully led the way, followed by 5 from Hamhuis and Erat (yes, Marty). This style of peppering the net is a continuation from Thursday vs St. Louis, and it's working.
2. The IMPEKKABLE Rinne Strikes Again - Well we all know who will start in net this Tuesday night. At this point, it will take a shutout from Dan Ellis to get back in net (once the Preds play in back to back games again) to force Rinne out from the pipes. He has clearly returned to his rookie form over the last stretch of his games.
3. Limiting Chances - What a performance by the defense tonight. To think they limited the speedy Montreal forwards to a mere 20 shots on goal (10 of which came in the 3rd period) is quite impressive. As you will later in my QUOTES section, head coach Barry Trotz felt all three phases of the D were clicking, which made it very tough on the Canadiens. On top of that, the Preds combined to block 10 shots as well. An impressive effort from all in regards to the defense.
4. The Puck Possession Game - Shea Weber spoke about this in the QUOTES section and it has a lot merit. The Preds really did make a concerted effort to keep the puck, make the smart neutral zone passes, and then also force turnovers. At the end of the night, Montreal had 9 giveaways and the Preds registered an equal 9 takeaways. Also, the Preds finished the night winning the faceoff war with a 54% rate.
5. Breaking A Team's Spirit - Trotz mentioned after the Preds 2nd goal the Habs looked defeated. Essentially, this style of game broke Montreal's spirit. Any time I see a team down one or two goals with a minute to go, and they are NOT pulling the goalie, that 's a fully defeated team. I'm sure Canadiens fans found this one painful to see with such a lack of effort from their skaters.
Other Notes:
* Tonight’s scratches for Nashville were Wade Belak, who reportedly has a lower body injury, and Alexander Sulzer. Colin Wilson remains on IR with a groin injury. For the Canadiens, Brian Gionta was a surprise scratch with a "lower body" injury. Gregory Stewart and Mathieu Carle were scratched as well.
* 1ST PERIOD
* 17:51 to go and somehow Montreal goaltender Carey Price makes an unbelievable (if not extremely lucky) save. The buck bounced off the ned boards and went into the air. Andreas Thuresson was crashing towards the net, found the puck at his feet next to Price's left post and put it on net. Price somehow got back in time from misplaying the end boards bounce and the puck went off of him and out to the crease. There was no opportunity for a rebound since the net was dislodged in the scramble for the puck. Just an amazing sequence that was quite surprising to not see the red lamp come on.
* GOAL for NASHVILLE - 9:12 to go. Steve Sullivan gets his revenge for the high stick Carey Price put on him earlier. Sully fired off a wrister just before Jaroslav Spacek got the full length of his body on the ice to black it. Price gives up a juicy rebound which Steve corralled, waited out Price one on one, and then snuck the puck in 5-hole when Price finally started his move to the opposite post. Serious patience shown by Sully which results in the goal. Sullivan (3) from Dumont (9). Preds take a 1-0 lead.
* END OF THE 1ST PERIOD – NSH: 1 MTL: 0 Positives - 24 shots on goal that period compared to Montreal's 4. Really solid neutral zone play by Nashville forced Montreal to really work to gain the offensive zone. Negatives - With that many SOG you want more than 1 cashed in. Lost 61% of the faceoffs taken.
* 2ND PERIOD
* 18:32 to go and the Preds waste a perfect man advantage goal opportunity. Arnott fed Sullivan perfectly on the back door play. Sullivan didn't manage to lift the puck on what should have been an easy goal, and this allowed Price to get a leg pad on it and make the stop. Large missed opportunity there.
* 5:43 to go and Ryan White takes a boarding penalty as he hits Joel Ward from behind. The dangerous part of this hit was that Ward went face first into the edge of his own bench. Very dangerous play that didn't look intentional so White only received a minor penalty. That said, you can be sure that the Beast had some words with Mr. White before he went to the box. Nothing came of the scrum however.
* 1:08 to go and with a penalty on Jason Arnott about to be called, the puck gets roofed high stick side off of a one timer. Much to the displeasure of many in the Sommet Center, it is rightly called a no goal with impending penalty. The real question was whether or not Arny did indeed interfere with the goalie. Upon seeing the replay, it looked like Jason may have got his skate in between Price's pads and knocked around the goalies footing, but wither or not that was indeed a penalty is hard to tell since no shots on goal came during that moment.
* END OF THE 2ND PERIOD – NSH: 1 MTL: 0 Positives - 42-10 lead in SOG. Defense is not giving up many shots for Peks to stop. Negatives - All those shots, but just one goal. It's scary that the Habs could pot one, and turn the whole game around despite 2 periods of Nashville domination.
* 3RD PERIOD
* 14:14 to go. The Preds offense has stalled a bit, while the Habs are mounting some more sustained pressure than previously seen in the first 2 periods. Rinne has made a couple of big stops in the last few minutes, including ones with rebound right in front. Peks has been tracking the puck well on the few shots he's seen in the game.
* 7:04 to go. Steve Sullivan makes a strong run towards the net, splits the D, and then draws the penalty. This will give the Preds 1:31 of 5 on 3. At this point Trotz elected to use his timeout.
* 5 on 3 POWER PLAY GOAL for NASHVILLE - 7:01 to go. Shea Weber lets the cannon go at the right point. Price makes the initial leg pad save, but can't get back to the other post in time to stop the Steve Sullivan rebound shot. Nice execution there no matter how it got done. Sullivan (4) from Weber (5) and Arnott (3). Sully… I mean NASHVILLE lead 2-0.
* 4:30o go and the Preds set a franchise record surpassing the 52 shots on goal mark set on October 14th in 1999 in a 5-1 loss vs San Jose. I have a feeling for the second game in a row the Preds win will cause the oppositions coaches and even possibly owner to have some interesting comments come out.
* FINAL SCORE – NSH - 2 MTL - 0.
My Three Stars:
1. Steve Sullivan - 2 goals, a +1 rating, a game leading 11 shots on goal, 1 hit, and 1 takeaway.
2. Pekka Rinne - 20 saves on 20 shots against. Rinne's 2nd shutout of the season.
3. Jason Arnott - 1 assist, a +1 rating, 3 shots on goal, 1 hit, and won 48% of his faceoffs.
Goalie Grade:A+ – The starting goaltender tonight was Pekka Rinne. Another perfect performance from Peks. Made all the right moves, tracked the puck well, and most of all he stopped all 20 shots he faced. Rinne has all but re-sealed his #1 status.
Quotes:
Brandon Felder - "Did you feel like this was one of the games where you guys put out a full 60 minute effort on offense?"
Steve Sullivan - "Yeah. I think it's been building. I really think San Jose it's been building so hopefully we can keep it going."
*
Felder - "Usually you like to see more shots than 4 in a period to build a rhythm. Were you a little nervous heading into those periods with being tested that many times?"
Pekka Rinne - "Well not too much. Obviously when the game is 1-0 even in the 1st period you realize that every single save counts and you can't really take it too easy even though we pretty much dominated those periods. Yeah, it's totally different because you kind of have to prepare yourself when there aren't too many shots, you kind of talk to yourself, and when there are opportunities to play the puck I try and do that to kind of keep myself in the game."
Felder - "There seemed to be a lot of pucks bouncing around the crease. How hard is it to track that with so many skaters around?"
Rinne - "It's always hard, but I think that's one of the things we've been getting better at. We got scored on a lot with situations like that earlier in the season but now the D-men are boxing the forwards out and that's helping out. It's our job to keep those rebounds out and they are helping out."
*
Felder - "When you have so few of shots against your team in those first couple of periods, is it something that you guys are doing in the neutral zone or something else?"
Shea Weber - "I think we just had a lot of puck possession tonight. We controlled the puck which when you keep the puck away from them it limits their offense. I thought we did a real good job at that especially in their end."
*
Felder - "When you look at just 10 shots against after 2 periods, do you attribute that to better neutral zone play or D-men cutting off angles?"
Barry Trotz - "It's all three zones. I thought we played well on the forecheck, we created a lot of turnovers. We didn't give them a lot in the neutral zone and defensively we did a really good job of maintaining position. We were controlling sticks, we were controlling the slot. To say it was just one zone is really probably not accurate. I thought we played a three-zone game. When you do that it's hard to play against. As I said to the guys after the game, "If you play that way all the time, it's hard to play against us." That's what we want. We want to be a team that is hard to play against, and when you come into this building every night, it'll be a tough place to play. That's when this place becomes Smashville."
Felder - "Sully obviously looked more like the point per game player everyone is used to. Do you feel like he's broken through the funk he had earlier in the season?"
Trotz - "Well one of the things I said when I talked to Sully was to just play instinctively. In the last little while he's been trying too hard to play like Sully. I said to just clear the computer upstairs and just play, play with your instincts. When he does that, he's good… he's really good."
Final Thoughts:
This was probably the most complete effort in a game I've seen from Nashville. Yes, there was a lack of finish, but they put shots on goal, maintained a lead, and played a full 60. I have to believe that tonight's game should be the template for all future games by the Preds. Tonight the system worked.
The Predators next game is Tuesday night vs those San Jose Sharks. I'm sure it will be a fierce one considering the rivalry involved. 7 PM start time. This one will not be shown on television so you better get to the rink to see it in person.
Till the next time, take care.
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