Nashville will look to continue riding the play of Pekka Rinne in the crease as he will excellent against the Ducks all series as he will match up against Martin Jones who continues to be the go to guy in the San Jose net.
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The Sharks weren t focusing on individual awards as they made their final preparations Friday morning for Game 1 of their second round playoff series against the Nashville Predators. The Predators got a power play goal from Shea Weber in Game 2 against the Ducks, but came up empty in their last 18 tries with the man advantage. They had numerous late chances to tie it while largely dominating the final two periods, but a redirected shot clanked off the post in the final minutes, and nothing went in during a frantic final minute.The Anaheim Ducks battled with dignity, almost doubling the Predators shots on goal with 37 to the winners 20.
Pick your poison: Ten different players scored a goal for Nashville in the Anaheim series (no one had more than two) and 15 different players had at least one point. The Ducks’ history of Game 7 losses isn’t why that puck didn’t bounce another inch to the right.
The Ducks were left with the same odd story to tell for another long summer. Nashville held on to beat the Ducks, the best team from the Pacific division, in a tight seven game series that ended 2-1 in Anaheim last night.
Nashville were 3-2 behind in the first-round series before clinching back-to-back wins to advance at the Ducks’ expense. Either way let’s just say Rinne is not the only one coming into game one with a ton of confidence. That’s probably a fair conclusion – both teams have good, not great, offenses and it’s more likely special teams and defense will be the deciding marks in this series. It’s a really good team we played against, and there’s a lot of good things we can take.
“I think that’s all you can ask for, is another chance to start Game 1 in San Jose and work from there”, Predators forward James Neal said.
“It’s nice to get to the second round”, Wilson said. And it’s hard not to think it may not cost Boudreau his job, even though some of his star players must shoulder the blame for this series loss as well. The Ducks flipped the script slightly with a furious final two periods in which they outshot Nashville, 28-10. But a redirected shot clanked off Rinne’s post in the third, and nothing went in during a frantic final minute, leaving the Ducks with a mountain of frustration. “I think our fans have been waiting for it, and we want to keep moving on”. San Jose’s top unit of Joe Thornton, Joe Pavelski and Tomas Hertl combined for 11 points in five games against Los Angeles, with Pavelski leading the team in goals with five.
Game 7 at the Honda Center.
DeBoer had empathy for Bruce Boudreau, who was sacked by the Anaheim Ducks on Friday.
Rinne had a 2.45 goals against average against the Ducks.
“I don’t feel like we should be done right now”, Kesler said. I thought he was going to get a couple tonight, before the game just because he’s been pushing to score. “We did everything the hard way”. The team captain scored two goals, with his second being the game-winner in the third period. The Devils played Florida that year in the first round and won Game 6 in overtime and Game 7 in double overtime.
The Ducks’ recent Game 7 failures followed similar scripts that all started with an early goal by the visitors: Detroit, Los Angeles and Chicago all scored in the opening 4 1/2 minutes.
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Thornton stole the puck away from Colton Sissons inside the Predators’ blue line and sent the puck to Pavelski, who had his shot blocked by Josi.
