Pekka Rinne Wraps Up a $49 Million Day with a 3-0 Win in Phoenix

Predators' goalie Pekka Rinne had a big day in Phoenix on Thursday when he signed a $49 million contract in the morning and then picked up his third shut out of the year in the evening, blanking the Coyotes 2-0 on his 29th birthday.

Rinne stopped all 35 Phoenix shots to extend his record to 6-4-2 in an amazing performance considering all of the day's excitement. Jason LaBarbara took the loss stopping 29 of 31 Predator shots.

The Predators goals came from Jon Blum, Matt Halischuk, and finally, an empty-netter from Patric Hornqvist to give him four goals in four games.

The Preds move on to San Jose where they will play the Sharks at 9:30 p.m. on Saturday.

Comments from the Couch...

First period...

Teemu Laakso and Brian McGrattan were scratched and Nick Spaling remains on Injured Reserve.

LaBarbara started in net for the second straight time against the Preds after winning 5-2 in the Preds's home opener

At 7:24, Boyd Gordon tripped Francis Bouillon and on the resulting Preds' power play both teams managed a shot.

Craig Smith had five shots in the first 10:45 of the game and six for the contest.

The Yotes picked up a second penalty at 10:46 when Keith Yandle tried to steal Jerred Smithson's stick. The most exciting part of the man-advantage was Mikkel Boedker stealing the puck from Mike Fisher and having his second short-handed shot on a breakaway on Rinne of the period.

1st Period	Goals	Shots	Corsi	PIMs	Faceoffs
Predators	0	11	27	0-0:00	15-8  65%
Coyotes	0	8	13	2-4:00	8-15  35%

Second Period...

The Coyotes had a good scoring chance 15 seconds in to the period when Rinne stopped a Daymond Langkow shot from the off side after a defensive breakdown.

The Preds had a great scoring chance at 7:29 when they had a two on one breakaway and Jordin Tootoo's pass hand-cuffed Smith's shot.

On the next shift, Blum intercepted a pass and wristed a shot past LaBarbara from the blue line to give the Preds a 1-0 lead.

Matt Halischuk was called for boarding Oliver Ekman-Larsson at 13:32.

After Halischuk came out of the box, Smith picked up a loose puck and created a break-away and fed the puck to Halischuk who flipped the puck past LaBarbara to give the Preds a 2-0 lead at 16:04.

2nd Period	Goals	Shots	Corsi	PIMs	Faceoffs
Predators	2	11	26	1-2:00	12-12 50%
Coyotes	0	13	13	0-0:00	12-12 50%

Third Period...

Phoenix went back on the power play at 3:05 when Ryan Suter was called for interference on Langkow. The Coyotes got a couple of shots including one where Rinne had to make a quality save.

Through the middle part of the period, the Predators had a few long shifts due to Phoenix keeping the pressure on and the Preds playing loose with the puck.

With 9:38 left in the contest, Rinne was pulled far out of the net and prone on the ice leaving Francis Bouillon in the crease and Kevin Klein finally being able to clear the puck.

Klein had to be helped off the ice at 13:09 when he took a slap shot from Adrian Aucoin on the ankle that sent him to the bench. The Preds were called for icing and called a time out. Klein was not forced to return for the puck drop. He did return for regular shifts after a short break.

With the net empty, Hornqvist took a pass from David Legwand to hit the empty net with 59.2 seconds left.

The Coyotes had one final power play chance when Smith was called for hooking with 50 seconds left.

3rd Period	Goals	Shots	Corsi	PIMs	Faceoffs
Predators	1	10	17	2-4:00	10-9 53%
Coyotes	0	14	30	0-0:00	9-10 47%

More Later...

Buddy Oakes for PredsOnTheGlass