The Nashville Predators and Ottawa Senators were in action Monday night at Bridgestone Arena as the only two franchises playing in a game. Everyone else had the night off.
Nashville fell 5-2 losing their fifth in a row as Ottawa won their fifth straight contest.
Ottawa had four players finish with two points on the night. Shane Pinto scored the game-winner in the third period after Nashville took the lead early in the third period.
“We took too many penalties. They’re a really good powerplay team, unnecessary penalties. Not winning hockey penalties,” head coach Andrew Brunette said. “It was hard to get our five-on-five game going… We looked a little fatigued and a little slow tonight. We got some momentum there at the start of the third.”
Nashville and Ottawa traded chances to get the first period going. The Senators had a few shots come from the slot but Juuse Saros stayed in position for a handful of saves.
“Not sure I loved a lot of it. In the last two games I’ve been as disappointed as I’ve been with our group,” Brunette said. “I understand tonight was a hard night. It was four games in six nights with travel. At the end of the day and where we’re at it’s a little disappointing in how we played. I don’t think we really gave ourselves a chance to be in the game between the penalties and the puck play.”
Defenseman Adam Wilsby had a couple of shots on offense after jumping up on a few plays. He continued to exude confidence while alongside Kevin Gravel who was recalled from the Milwaukee Admirals before the game.
The Senators continued to press on offense and ended up seeing forward Drake Batherson tap home a loose puck with pandemonium ensuing around Saros.
The goal went to a review and was deemed not a goal. Ottawa then challenged for no goalie interference. Their second look failed and Nashville wasn’t able to convert on the powerplay as the game remained scoreless through one period of play.
After killing off an early slashing penalty the Predators found the back of the net first as Filip Forsberg scored his 19th of the season. Vinnie Hinostroza settled the puck on the left wall during a rush then passed it off to Josi.
The captain then dished a pass to Forsberg who slid the puck by Anton Forsberg to take a 1-0 lead.
Ottawa answered back with a goal from Adam Gaudette after Tim Stützle initially drove in on Saros. His shot went off of Saros’ glove and Gaudette was there to bury his 16th of the season to make it 1-1.
Three minutes later the Senators set up once more on offense and D-man Jake Sanderson found the back of the net as traffic was in front of Saros. Ottawa took a 2-1 lead on Sanderson’s fifth goal of the season.
Nashville had an early powerplay in the third frame after Travis Hamoinc was called for holding Gustav Nyquist to end the second period.
Jonathan Marchessault evened it up 2-2 on the powerplay after Nashville was swiftly passing the puck around. Ryan O’Reilly found Marchessault in the slot for the one-timer with the quick pass coming from the bottom of the left circle.
It was his fourth powerplay goal of the season with his last one coming 16 games ago. Nashville was 0-for-10 on the man advantage in their last four games and 0-for-1 tonight before Marchessault’s goal.
Ottawa came back to reclaim the lead as defenseman Thomas Chabot fired a shot on net from the blue line and Gaudette was in front of traffic. The rebound found Pinto on the backdoor and he scored to make it 3-2 with 13:43 to play.
The Senators added some salt to the wound as David Perron converted on the powerplay with just under six minutes to play.
Ottawa held on for the 5-2 win as they continued their hot play as of late. Ridly Grieg scored on the empty net to close out the night and hand his team their fifth win in a row.
Nashville will have the next three days off from game action before traveling to Chicago to face the Blackhawks in their penultimate matchup.
The last game against Chicago is back in Nashville on March 8.
Follow Nick Kieser on Twitter/X: @KieserNick
Photos courtesy of the Nashville Predators
Comments