Streaky Predators March Onward and Friday Findings

The strange and curious ways of this year's version Nashville Predators continued on their mysterious journey last night with the Predators fourth loss in a row in the City of Brotherly Love. Oddly enough, the Preds still cling to fourth place in the Western Conference, but are only three points out of tenth.

All but three of the Predators 18 regulation losses have been included in two five game game losing streaks and two four game streaks, one of which is still active.

On the flip side, the Preds started the season with an eight game point streak, have a nine game point streak, and have six and three game win streaks too.

Any Predator fan with a weak constitution probably should change their allegiance because the streakiness does not seem to be going anywhere this year.

I have pestered Barry Trotz for answers on the subject and he has none. He has correctly pointed out that the losses have all been for different reasons.

The one common thread that appears to be prevalent is the lack of offense during the down periods. In the current four game slide, the Preds have scored six goals and have lost by one goal in three of the four. In the five gamer in December, five goals in five games were all the Preds could muster.

Our hope, as fans of the team, is that with 20 of the last 30 games on home ice that we are due a few more long win streaks to counter the slide that the Preds are currently mired within. A return to the four goals a game average during the last six game win streak would make a big difference too.

Preds-Flyers Round-Up...

Here is our game story from last night.

Kudos to Kevin Klein for sticking up for Marcel Goc against Dan Carcillo. Hockey Fights has the bout.

The Tennessean has the AP story while Josh Cooper had postgame quotes.

From the blog world reports come from Amanda DiPaolo, Mark Willoughby (who was at the game), Dirk Hoag (with his advances stats), What the Puck, and Hockey Night in Nashville.

Happy stories about the game come from Russ Cohen, Broad Street Hockey, Philly.com, Philly Burbs, Courrier Post, and CSN Philly.

In Pred Nation...

Last night's Top Ten Predator Moments on FS TN was a lot of fun. Additional airings will be on February 6 at 5 p.m. CT, February 9 at 9 p.m. CT and February 15 at 10 p.m. CT.

Today from 1:00-2:00 Jeremy Gover will join Darren McFarland on 560AM for an hour of puck talk.

Mike Morreale explains why Pekka Rinne loves participating in shoot-outs.

Predators prospect Ryan Ellis was named the OHL Defenseman of the Month for January. This is the second award for Ellis this year as he also won it in November.

Paul McCann has a variety of topics in a post but focuses on a few wild allegations on struggling franchised made by Kevin Wheeler of St. Louis. It is amazing to me that folks still like to include Nashville as a team "in trouble" when things could not be more stable at this point.

Dirk Hoag's conspiracy theory article got big play at Puck Daddy yesterday.

Here is a new criticism of the Predators, a bad logo. This is a first. Of all the things the team has taken flack for, the logo has held it's own.

Around the NHL...

Adrian Dater has a interesting piece on the masterful job that Detroit's Ken Holland has done.

In the aftermath of the Johnson-DiPietro bout on Wednesday, Patten Fuqua takes a look at past top goalie fights. RLD Hockey has video of a couple of epic fights.

Patrick Hoffman takes a look at what is different with Alexander Ovechkin this season.

From @kausatoday: Dominik Hasek, 46, won 10 of 11 games in January, earning four shutouts. He leads the KHL this season with seven. May play into his 50s.

Here is the new NHL Heritage Classic spot with Gordon Pinsent's narration. Watch it here before you see it 1000 times over the next few weeks.



Odds and Ends...

Now that NASA is stepping aside in the space business, a new private firm plans to launch a commercial space station in 2015 that will dwarf the current International Space Station.

This guy was missing the rest of Danny Ocean's crew when he got arrested for stealing chips at the Bellagio.

Special Super Bowl Badges at Foursquare will be on the line on Sunday.

More Later...

Buddy Oakes for PredsOntheGlass

Leino Leads Flyers to 3-2 Win over the Predators

Ville Leino scored two goals, including the game winner, to give the Philadelphia Flyers a 3-2 victory over the Nashville Predators at the Wells Fargo Center on Thursday night.

Jeff Carter also had a goal and added two assists as the Flyers broke a three game losing streak on a night that Bobby Clarke was honored in front of the highly spirited Philly crowd. Claude Giroux also had two helpers.

The Predators got goals from Marcel Goc and Joel Ward but could not keep up with the high scoring Flyers. The loss was the fourth in a row for Nashville with the Predators only scoring six goals during the streak.

In goal, Sergei Bobrowski won the battle of the rookie netminders, stopping 26 of 28 Predator shots. Anders Lindback played his best game in six weeks but still gave up three goals on 29 Philadelphia shots.

The Preds and Flyers started the game playing a close, checking game with only seven combined shots in the first ten minutes. All that changed quickly when both teams scored goals 59 seconds apart.

The Flyers struck first at 10:18 after a Predator turnover at the blue line when Carter out-faked Alexander Sulzer and put the puck past Lindback. At 11:17, Cody Franson skated into the Flyers zone and sent a shot at the net that rebounded directly to Goc who put it past Bobrovsky to tie the game 1-1.

The first period ended with no penalties and fairly even play. Both teams had several scoring chances on odd man rushes after turnovers. The Flyers led in shots 9-8 and in the Corsi 20-14.

The Predators got a bad break at 10:48 in the second when Goc appeared to have scored his second goal of the game but the officials waived off the goal due to alleged incidental contact by Patric Hornqvist on Bobrovski.

With 58.2 seconds left, Kevin Klein took on noted brawler, Dan Carcillo after he had shoved Goc into the boards at center ice. Both Klein and Carcillo received fighting majors and Carcillio picked up an additional two minute minor for boarding.

In the second period, the Predators played much better but were unable to get on the board. The Preds out shot the Flyers 13-8 led the Corsi 21-18.

The Flyers came back and scored the go ahead goal on the power play at 6:55 in the third period when Carter shot from the corner and Leino picked up a rebound and stuffed it between Lindback's pad and the post to make it 2-1 Flyers.

The penalty on Ward that gave the the Flyers the man advantage was more than questionable as Ward had been mugged repeatedly by Danny Briere before the call went against him.

At 10:18, Ward retaliated against the Flyers when he and came back with his own power play goal on a rebound after a Shea Weber shot and a Marty Erat fumble to tie the game 2-2.

The Flyers got the final tally with 3:14 left in the game when Claude Giroux centered a perfect pass to Leino who was open in the slot and was able to one-time it past Lindback to secure the victory.

In the final period, the Flyers out shot the Preds 12-7 and led the Corsi 15-14.

In spite of the loss, the Predators held on to fourth place in the Western Conference with 61 points. There is no room for further slips as there are only three points separating the Predators and tenth place Calgary.

The Predators returned home immediately after the game where it will not get any easier as they will face the Central Division leading Detroit Red Wings on Saturday at the Bridgestone Arena at 7 p.m.

More Later...

Buddy Oakes for PredsOnTheGlass

Predators and Their Dads Head to Philadelphia and Thursday Thoughts

The Nashville Predators (27-17-7) are in Philadelphia with their dads in tow for the annual Father's trip. It is a rare visit to the city of Brotherly love for tonight's game with the Flyers (33-13-5) at the Wells Fargo Center at 6 p.m. Central.

After losing three in a row, the Predators will have a tough foe in the Eastern Conference leading Flyers. This will be a statement game for Philadelphia who are not happy after losing three in a row including a 4-0 loss to the Lightning in Tampa on Tuesday.

The Philadelphia crowd will be in top form as there will be a ceremony honoring Flyers legend Bobby Clark before the game when he will be predsented his banner from the old Spectrum.

This will only be the third meeting in four years between the Preds and Flyers and the first in Philadelphia since March 7, 2009 when the Preds lost 4-1. In their only meeting last season the Preds won 4-3 in a shoot out near the end of the regular season.

It will be an odd match-up with the Flyers having the league's second highest goals per game (3.39) and the Preds having the fourth best goals against (2.33).

Pekka Rinne (17-13-5, 2.10, .929) is expected to be in goal for the Predators. The Flyers leading goalie has been rookie surprise Sergei Bobrovsky (21-7-3, 2.49, .917) but they could also go with Brian Boucher (11-6-2, 2.37, .916) since it is a non-conference contest.

Updated: Anders Lindback will start in goal for the Preds.

The Predators will return home after the game to prepare for Saturday's division match with Detroit set for 7 p.m. at the Bridgestone Arena.

Other previews come from Amanda DiPaolo, Chris Burton, The Tennessean, and Predators.com.

From Philly comes previews from Broad Street Hockey, Philly.com, Philly Burbs, Courrier Post, and CSN Philly.

Programming Note...

I was a guest host on Ryan Porth's RLD Hockey Radio yesterday where Dan Rosen from NHL.com was the only guest. There was plenty of talk about the All-Star weekend and the season going forward. You can listen with the following player.

Listen to internet radio with Ryan Porth on Blog Talk Radio

In Pred Nation...

Launy "The" Schwartz gets Shea Weber to do sonething rarely seen in Nashville media circles. Check out the video at Hockey 54.

Here is the audio from Pekka Rinne's visit to NHL Live yesterday. Peks was in good spirts and was very entertaining.

Dirk Hoag proves with facts that preferential treatment for the original six teams is not a conspiracy theory. Congrats to Dirk and the OTF gang for their millionth visitor. They are also planning an OTF viewing party for next week with Dan Bradley leading the charge.

David Boclair talked to Steve Sullivan who feels that he will return within a week or so.

Shea Weber was named the NHLPA Player of the week yesterday at the PA's website.

Josh Cooper spoke with BlakeGeoffrion after he was named the AHL Player of the Week.

Colin Wilson blogs about his all-star break and conserving energy.

Bryan Mullen discusses the recent success of Marty Erat.

Chris Burton has a breakdown of the defensive lapse that allowed Calgary to tie the Preds 2-2 in the third period of Tuesday's game. It's even uglier here.

Tyler Davis has his latest Predator update at NHL Hot Stove.

Patten Fuqua has all the news from the AHL All-Star game that he covered on Monday night.

Federal officials raided the home of ex-arena naming rights principle Brian Whitfield on Tuesday with the intent to seize property to help satisfy an outstanding judgment. Whitfield's wife, Marsha filed bankruptcy which slowed the process.

Around the NHL...

Oddities in the NHL last night included Brent Johnson and Rick DiPietro in a goalie fight (if you can call it a fight) and Johan Franzen scoring five goals in the Wings 7-5 win over the Sens.

Roger Millions checks in after the Flames beat the Preds with a question of whether Calgary has what it takes to make a run at the playoffs.

Ryan Porth also looks at the Flames' charge into the playoff picture.

Our friend Dannielle Browne has a new endeavor with the creation of Straight Jackets to follow her Columbus Blue Jackets. She is part of the G9 network of female writers in all sports.

Jef Blay has the top ten late round picks in the last ten years. Three Predators are included but I'm sure most folks will be astounded by the order.

The daily Peter Forsberg update from Adrian Dater comes complete with video.

The Lightning waived Mike Smith in somewhat of a surprise move yesterday. It will be interesting to see if there are any takers when the period ends at 11 a.m. today.

The new darling of the NHL, Jeff Skinner won the Rookie of the Month for January.

Lou Lamoriello is denying that the potential sale of the Devils will affect hockey operations. Is this like sticking your head in the sand?

Odds and Ends...

It's good to see that the Metro Council finally decided not to raze the historic Nashville Speedways at the Fairgrounds. Tearing it down would be as stupid as closing Opryland to build a mall that now appears may never reopen. What about tearing down Opry Mills and putting in a theme park?

The Nashville RollerGirls are looking for sponsors for the upcoming season.

The new Android Market web site is live and is useful to find stuff you may be looking for that doesn't jump out at you on your phone.

A new study shows that it costs marketers $1.07 to get someone to be a fan of their product. I'll cut out the middleman and become a fan of anything if they send me a tax free dollar bill.

More Later...

Buddy Oakes for PredsOnTheGlass

Why The Flyers Could Win The Cup and Wednesday Wrap-Up

With three days before the Stanley Cup Finals begain on Saturday, we are going to take a look at how each team can win today and tomorrow then give our predictions on Friday.

First up, we will look at the Philadelphia Flyers who have soared through their last nine games, winning all but one. So what are some of the reasons why whey could win the Cup?

Destiny: The team has had a storybook tale ever since clinching a playoff berth in a shootout on the last day of the season. They handled the Devils with little trouble. They won four in a row to come back from an 0-3 deficit against the Bruins for the first time in 35 years. Then they beat a Habs team that had a couple of miracles to their own credit.

Chris Pronger: Whether you like the big guy or not, he comes alive when the playoffs start. His teams have made the playoffs every season since 1996. He has 116 points in 164 playoff games. He won a ring in 2007 with the Ducks and fell one game short with the Oilers the year before.

Goaltending: Since his return, when Brian Boucher went down in the second round, Michael Leighton is 6-1 with a .948 save percentage and a 1.45 goals against average. He had three shutouts in the four wins against the Habs.

Scoring Power: The Flyers have several folks that have been contributing in the playoffs. Mike Richards has 21 points. Danny Briere has four game winning goals. Claude Giroux has really come into his own in the post season. Simon Gagne and a host of others have taken turns scoring key goals and making the big play.

Defense: The Flyers will have one of two of the best D-men in hockey on the ice almost the whole game in Chris Pronger and Kimmo Timonen. In key situations they each have pushed 30 minutes in ice time. Matt Carle and Braydon Coburn have been good line mates for the top two.

Special Teams: In the playoffs, the Flyers have 17 power play goals to lead all teams. They also are second on the penalty kill with a 87% success rate which has been needed since they have been hit with 193 pims, the second most in the post season.

Toughness: This year’s version of the Flyers has put the bully back in Broad Street. They aren’t afraid to hit and play with grit through out the entire line up. During the regular season, the Flyers had four players with over 100 pims.

Hossa is on the Opponent ;) Although there is nothing to it I’m sure, Marion Hossa is appearing in his third finals in three years and is yet to win the cup.

X-Factor: Both the Flyers and the Hawks are loaded on the top two lines so the difference may come down to secondary scoring on the lower lines and whether an unexpected player comes out of no where to be the hero as we have seen so many times in years past.

Come back tomorrow for the low-down on the Blackhawks.

Thanks to Patrick Hoffman and Kukla's Korner...

We would like to thank Patrick Hoffman and Kukla's Korner for running an interview with me about how PredsOnTheGlass came about and a wide range of other topics. Kukla's is one of the best and most widely read hockey sites on the internet so it was a privilege to spread a little Predators hockey to their audience since they do not currently have a Preds representative in their stable of excellent writers. Thanks again guys!

In Pred Nation...

Predator "prospect" Alexander Radulov was named the MVP of the KHL yesterday.

Predators.com has the final stats amd medals for all in the organization that participated in the World Championships.

Paul McCann has a few comments on the finals and a preview of tonight's SlapShot Radio Show.

Chris Burton looks at next year's Predator defense at OnTheForecheck.

Jas Faulkner has a good piece about former Preds and other teams helping the Nashville Flood Relief at The Hockey Writers.

Rachel continues her year end wrap-up with part 2 in a series at What The Puck.

Cycward wraps up the Cincinnati Cyclones season in a very complete fashion.

Around the NHL...

Steve Yzerman was named the Tampa Bay Lightning's new GM at a Press conference yesterday. Puck Daddy has a good commentary on slowing down the circus in Bolt Country. Mirtle discusses how Yzerman was in the running for the Detroit job a while back. I heard Jon Jordan on XM last night and he was excited. Here's some points that he made.

The NHL Combine is underway with 100 players reporting to Toronto for interviews and tests. NHL.com has a blog featuring numerous stories every day.

The best Eulogy of the post-season is the Hab's at Puck Daddy.

Craig Custance has an interesting story of what led to Marion Hossa becoming the first player to go to the finals with three different teams in consecutive years.

Puck Report looks at the number of games it takes to win the Cup through four rounds. The record for the least is Edmonton in 18 games in 1988. So far, Chicago is 12-4 while Philadelphia is 12-5.

Chris Wassel is trying out his new gig at the Devil's Examiner with a preview of the finals.

The final segment of Kingcast's 5-part series is now up. This is a good time to watch them all as it is a very good discussion between the best of the best of Kings writers.

Steve Lapore confirms that Versus will air Hockey Central every night during the finals.

Ryan at the RLD takes a look at Five Conn Smythe Finalists.

The Arizona Republic indicates that he NHL has a buyer in hand for the club if no one solidifies a deal in Phoenix by 12/31. I assume the team will move back to the Peg if nothing is resolved.

Whay is one half of the Carolina Hurricanes worth? Not as much as you would expect, according to Forbes.

This story about the NHL embracing social media is a few weeks old but is still timely.

Adam Foote will return to the Avs for another season.

The celebration got out of hand for one Flyers fan who had to be Tasered at work yesterday morning. Intent to Blow has the details.

AHL Playoffs...

Game seven in the AHL Western Conference playoffs will take place tonight when Hamilton hosts Texas with a Calder Cup berth on the line. A bit of added flair was announced yesterday when it was revealed that P K Subban and Ben Maxwell will bolster the Bulldogs line up for the rubber match in the series. The game can be heard on XM Radio.

Odds and Ends...

Tony Hawk says it's a long way from Dogtown... The Protec Pool Party 2010. There is some amazing stuff here.

Creed Bratton from The Office recently visited MTV to offer interns advice and also sings a song. He actually has released a real album.

Great advice from Seth Godin for everyone.

Here is a great photo gallery of pictures from the gulf oil spill from Boston.com. Here's a representation to see the scale of the spill.

More Later...

Buddy Oakes for PredsOnTheGlass

Game Recap: Predators Defeat Flyers 4-3 In Shootout

Coach Barry Trotz Postgame Comments

Pekka Rinne, Jered Smithson, Steve Sullivan and Jason Arnott Post Game Comments

Coach Peter Laviolette, Danny Briere, Chris Pronger, and Brian Boucher post game comments

The Nashville Predators were not at their best , but managed to beat the Philadelphia Flyers in a shoot out in a hard fought, physical contest on Tuesday night at the Bridgestone Arena.

Martin Erat had the game winner in the shoot out to clinch the victory for the Preds. The Predators also got goals in regulation from Steve Sullivan, Jered Smithson and Erat.

Pekka Rinne was the uncontested first star of the game, stopping 42 of 45 Flyers shots plus all three attempts in the shootout.

Jeff Carter, Simon Gagne and Chis Pronger had goals for the Flyers while Danny Briere added two assists.

Michael Leighton started the game for the Flyers and gave up two goals on five shots before leaving with what appeared to be a lower body injury 9:45 into the game. Brian Boucher came on in relief and stopped 24 of 25 Predator shot and took the overtime loss.

Scoring Recap...

The Flyers took an early lead in the first period at 1:21 when there was a breakdown in the Preds defense around the net allowing Jeff Carter to get the game's first goal.

The Predators came back quickly at 4:33, when Steve Sullivan scored on an odd play where Michael Leighton stopped the puck but it was loose in the blue ice behind him and Sully jumped on it to tie the game 1-1. Sullivan said that he and the official were the only folks on the ice that actually saw the puck behind the goalie.

At 7:04, Marty Erat put the Predators ahead 2-1 on a play where Jason Arnott and Dan Hamhuis assisted..

Leighton was removed from the game after an odd fall at 9:45 and Boucher entered the game. Twenty seconds later, Jerred Smithson gave Boucher a rude welcome with is ninth goal of the year.

That was the end of the scoring until 11:14 in the third period when Simon Gagne got the puck past Rinne to cut the Predator lead to 3-2.

Dan Hamhuis was called for a delay of game at 12:43 when he knocked the net loose from its moorings. On the ensuing power play, Mike Richards found Chis Pronger wide open in the slot and he buriedthe puck past Rinne to tie the game.

The game remained scoreless through the overtime period and Marty Erat was the only scorer in the shoot out to end the game on a winning note for the Predators.


Storylines From The Game

Pekka Was ImPekkable (Brandon Felder's term)...

The Predators never would have been in the game had it not been for the stellar play of goaltender Pekka Rinne. An entire highlight reel of plays could have been put together from the many saves he made from the pesky Flyer team.

During the first period alone, when the Preds were not at their best, Rinne stopped 16 of 17 Flyer shots and the one goal was not of his making. In one sequence he made three saves in a row, all at odd angles as he recovered from the prior shot.

Chris Pronger of the Flyers took notice of Rinne's play, "He made good stops. We probably didn't get as much traffic in front of him as we would like. He did a great job of keeping his site on the pucks."

Barry Trotz was more adamant in saying, "Pekka was the number one star, no question about that."

Pekka was pleased with his performance and the roll he has been on, winning three straight and taking the NHL third star of the week on Monday. "It felt good. I felt like I was seeing the puck really well. They shot the puck a lot and that gets you into the game. The game kind of gets easier and slows down in front of you. I like that feeling."

Predators Won on a Night When They Were Sluggish...

The Flyers played an incredibly physical game and managed to clog up the neutral zone for most of the game. Their excellent forechecking made attempts to dump the puck into the Flyers zone a risky venture. The Flyers had more energy early in the game a nd took advantage of the Predators sluggishness.

Barry Trotz explained the team's dilemma, "We’ve played a lot of games, had a lot of travel. There wasn’t a lot of juice on our bench today. Guys were trying, but there wasn’t a lot of pop."

Trotz continued, "I knew it was going to be a tough game coming in, coming off that road trip. Emotionally, I don’t want to say exhausting, but it was challenging. Today was a big challenge against a team that is obviously playing with some desperation."

Predators Move One Step Closer to a Playoff Berth...

Pekka Rinne indicated that the Preds are still looking to move up and not just hang on to their position, "You look at the standings and there are many teams within five points. It’s still our goal to catch up and we know if we keep going like this, we can do well. Those two points are really important."

The Predators win moved them to 83 points and closer to the teams ahead of them. Los Angeles was idle on Tuesday and is sitting at 85 points in sixth place with two games in hand. Colorado is one point ahead of L.A. with only a game in hand.

Looking in the other direction, Detroit is three back in eighth with one game in hand and Calgary is now six back, also with a game in hand.

Up Next...

The Predators continue their homestand on Thursday night against the Minnesota Wild and will be looking for two more points to move closer to clinching a playoff spot.

More Later...

Buddy Oakes for PredsOnTheGlass