The Nashville Predators set a new record in franchise history as they concluded their five-game road trip on Sunday evening.
Over the last 9 days, the Nashville Predators have won five in a row, all of which came on the same trip. Now general manager Barry Trotz has to decide what to do with the trade deadline coming up on March 8.
“We’re really playing for each other through this stretch of games,” head coach Andrew Brunette said after his team won 4-2 in Anaheim Sunday evening. We’re growing as a group and growing together. It was a good trip and we go home and have a tough week ahead.”
Nashville has the Ottawa Senators, Minnesota Wild, Colorado Avalanche, Montreal Canadiens, and Buffalo Sabres coming to town for the longest homestand remaining in the season. The Predators only have two more stints of consecutive games at Bridgestone Arena the rest of the campaign.
To this point, the Predators are 14-15-0 at home this season and since the start of 2024 are 3-6-0 in their own building. They’ve not won more than three in a row here all season with only time doing so being from Nov. 18-22.
“It was a hard road trip, let’s get some rest and try not to put so much pressure on ourselves at home and keep our road game mentality at home and see what happens,” Brunette said.
Nashville never trailed in any game on their trip and maintained pressure for most games throughout their lineup. Brunette and his staff relied on the same lineup each game. That produced something the Predators needed desperately which was depth scoring.
Every skater on the roster –– aside from scratches –– picked up a point on this trip. Filip Forsberg scored the only 2 powerplay goals. https://t.co/ATyzjTmBqn
— Nick Kieser🏒 (@KieserNick) February 26, 2024
Forward Kiefer Sherwood led all skaters with five even strength points and a two-goal performance in San Jose highlighting his trip. However, Sherwood had some company as well in the points column.
Colton Sissons earned four points and then looking down the line Michael McCarron scored three. Ryan O’Reilly only got on the board in St. Louis and then ended his trip with an assist.
“We’re just trying to play. We’re not looking too far ahead of the fog,” Brunette said. “It’s exciting for our group, we worked really hard to get here. I thought we matured as a group and we put ourselves in a position to have fun here down the stretch.”
The 10 standing points are good enough to put the Predators back into the second Wild Card spot, it’ll be put up or shut up time with the five biggest home games of the season to this point.
Out of the 23 games remaining nine are against Central Divisional opponents while eight are versus current playoff teams as of Feb. 26.
Defenseman Dante Fabbro stated the Predators owe it to their fans for good games and want to put forth their best efforts.
“Everyone cares so much about our performance and each other, we want to do well,” Fabbro said. “When things were going bad it can be tough to not be positive but we stuck together and looking now we’re starting to string together some wins.”
Follow Nick Kieser on Twitter/X: @KieserNick
Photos courtesy of Nashville Predators
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