The Nashville Predators fell 4-3 on Tuesday night to the Calgary Flames. They’ve now lost eight games in a row, tying their franchise record that took place back in April 2013.
“Couple of big breakdowns & we kind of got to not managing the puck quite well for a stretch of the game,” head coach Andrew Brunette said. “Made a little bit of a mistake on the first goal & the second one hurt. Got running around there on a few of those goals, some of our youngsters, it happens.”
Nashville went on the powerplay first just two minutes into the contest as the Flames were called for too many men on the ice. The Predators squandered their first look on the powerplay as they weren’t able to muster a shot on Flames goalie Dan Vladar.
As the Predators got into a rhythm forward Steven Stamkos drove into the offensive zone with pressure from defenseman Kevin Bahl. He tried to feed a pass to Filip Forsberg for a shot, instead, Forsberg carried the puck behind the net to feed the puck back to Stamkos.
Then Jonathan Marchessault was in the slot as he positioned himself for a deflection to give Nashville a 1-0 lead. Brunette harped on his team to move the puck in practice, albeit it was one play, the Predators seized a prime opportunity to execute their plan.
Calgary fired back 2:37 later with a shot on net from Nazem Kadri. The puck trickled past Juuse Saros as he screened from seeing the play develop.
Nashville wasn’t done in the first frame of play as Tommy Novak snapped his 15-game goal drought. Luke Evangelista & Mark Jankowski broke into Flames territory on the right side as Novak was the final forward in on the play uncovered. The Predators exited the first period with a 2-1 lead.
“It was good to see Novak, I thought he & Evangelista had their best game. I thought they were dangerous, looked like my expectations are of them,” Brunette said. “Too bad they didn’t get rewarded with another one & it was nice to see Marchessault get two. Hopefully, he feels pretty good about himself.”
Predators captain Roman Josi was the lone skater to not emerge from the locker room to back into the game. Nashville announced he would not return to the game after suffering a lower-body injury. There was no update on Josi after the game.
The Flames came out with a vengeance in the second stanza as they were hounding on pucks in the waking moments. Walker Duehr found Kevin Rooney on the rush to even the game back up at 2-2.
“The second period we were taking on water the whole time,” defenseman Marc Del Gaizo said. “In the third we had a good push there. I had a few chances there to tie it up there at the end but we the second period was pretty tough for us.”
Nashville continued to have an answer offensively & this time a rush chance started from the Predators’ defensive zone with Stamkos winning a faceoff. Forsberg broke up the middle of the ice with Rasmus Andersson trying to put pressure on him, however, that didn’t matter as he floated a pass to Marchessault to make it 3-2.
It was Marchessault’s first multi-goal performance in 46 games with his last coming on March 12 this year with the Vegas Golden Knights.
Calgary began to put their stamp on Nashville in the final seven minutes of the second period. Flames defenseman Brayden Pachal scored his first goal of the season as Jakob Pelletier found him all along on the top of the offensive zone. Pachal lasered a wrister past Saros to tie it at 3-3.
Mark Jankowski then took an unsportsmanlike penalty after barking at an official going back to the bench. The Flames took advantage as Jonathan Huberdeau cleaned up a loose rebound in the crease to give Calgary a 4-3 lead after 40 minutes of play.
The Flames sat on their lead to take down the Predators as they lost an eighth consecutive game. Nashville pulled Saros with a few minutes remaining but a flurry of chances wasn’t enough to even the score.
“I think we have to stick with it. It’s been a tough stretch & tough start to the season all around. We have to stick with it here together, we’re going to get through this together,” Del Gaizo said.
Up Next
The Predators are on the road for two games before hosting a five-game homestand going into Christmas.
Max Herz & Hal Gill have the call on Thursday night in Dallas as the Predators take on the Stars then fly to Denver to face off against the Avalanche on Saturday.
Follow Nick Kieser on Twitter/X: @KieserNick
Photos courtesy of the Nashville Predators
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