Washington Capitals 2-3 Nashville Predators
“Washington” came into the home game with “Nashville” in great form. The Capitals scored in nine games in a row (7-0-2) and won the previous day. Also, Alexander Ovechkin scored goals in a row (7 goals) in a series of four games, while Evgeny Kuznetsov scored 11 points (2 + 7) in the previous seven games.
True, this time the scythe found a stone, because the Predators themselves are now in very good shape. They have been 5-1-2 in the last eight games and have approached their journey to the capital with a two-win streak. They won the last one the day before, by winning away from Carolina (5:3). This game was notable for the brilliant success of goalkeeper Juuse Saros, who saved up to 64 shots on goal (the third most in league history for regular season games).
Naturally, after the struggles won the previous day, the head coaches put the reserve goalkeepers in the second game in a row. Caps gate guarded by Charlie Lindgren, Kevin Lankinen takes his place in the Predators line. Both looked good in the game, reflecting 29 and 19 shots respectively, but this time the main characters were the fielders.
One of them, of course, was the Russian striker. He’s just not the most anticipated person. And not even Kuznetsov. Yakov Train from Nashville showed himself brilliantly.
Overall, Trenin is an excellent team player, primarily a defensive player. It is used a lot to neutralize the opponent’s leaders and the minority. But even in an unfamiliar territory, he is useful and especially good in his periodic wrestling and inspirational passages. This showed itself in the reporting match.
First, Yakov won a big fight on the broadsides in Washington’s hands and threw the puck at Thomas Novak. Well, the American striker advanced on the free ice and hit the net with the fourth goal and seventh point in the ninth game of the season after being called from the farm club! It is interesting that the striker, who made his debut in the strongest league in the world in the last championship, scored the same seven points, but scored only one goal in 21 games.
About six minutes later, Sonny Milano stabilized and the striker, who after a pretty good season turned out to be completely unnecessary for Anaheim, was assisted by Russian defender Dmitry Orlov as one of the assistants.
But even before the break, he said the great word of Train again. The puck broke into someone else’s territory, beat the defender with a “spinorama”, and still remained in an advantageous position when the puck got away and got into the fight. As a result, the partners were able to deliver the puck to the Russian again and hit Lindgren like a baseball, instantly catching the puck and scoring his fifth goal and the 12th point of the season!
The teams that set the bar for beauty kept up with it in the future, even though there were very few goals, one each in the second and third periods.
Nicholas Obe-Kubel made a great pass in the second part of the match. The striker took the puck in the middle of the court, won the fight, took a turn, accelerated, dived into the area, effectively passed Nino Niederreiter, who was trying to intercept him, and threw the bullet. The net between Lindgren’s shields.
For Obe-Kubela, this disc was the second of the season and was different two days in a row. Interestingly, the forward is a Stanley Cup holder as part of Colorado and before that he scored his last goal as part of Avalanche in April. Obe-Kubel started this season in Toronto, but after six goalless games, he ended up in Washington where he did not differ in 12 more games. This back to back, he wasn’t supposed to be playing at all, but Nick Dowd got a chance as he went to live with his second-born wife. Life writes the best scenarios…
In the match, everything was decided in the third period, with the elegant goal of defender Ryan McDonagh, who after the signing of Matt Duchen found himself facing Lindgren and effectively beat him. goal in the fall.
The goal was the first goal for the defensive lineman with the Predators after a summer trade from Tampa Bay, which had won two Stanley Cups in previous seasons.
With just over three minutes left to play, Lavioletta’s team had no time to do anything. Thus, the series of Ovechkin and Kuznetsov was interrupted, since both did not take any effective action.
The captain was very active, recording four shots, five powerful moves and a block at 22:29 on the ice. But a repeat of Mike Gartner’s record has been delayed by at least one game: The next goal will be Alexander the Great’s 30th in the current campaign, then the second hockey player in NHL history to have 17 seasons with at least 30 goals. .
Winnipeg Jets 4-2 Tampa Bay Lightning
The game against Winnipeg was special for Tampa Bay’s Russian leader Nikita Kucherov because it was the National Hockey League’s 600th game of the regular season.
He recorded it with another abandoned disc, who had a great orientation in someone else’s territory and fired at Connor Hellibuck with an instant-biting shot from an average distance.
This goal helped Yıldırım take the lead for the second and final time in the match and helped Nikita score 16 (3 + 13) points in the last 11 games.
True, it was not possible to win the “lightning”. As in the first case after Anthony Cirelli’s goal, the balance was thus achieved by Pierre-Luc Dubois, who scored. There was also an anniversary – the 400th league game.
Well, in the third period, Kyle Connor gave the Jets a majority lead and then Morgan Barron slammed into the doorway that Andrei Vasilevski had left in the end. Moreover, in this match, the Russian goalkeeper made only 16 saves and surrendered three times. Well, “Winnipeg” confirmed its excellent form by winning their fourth consecutive victory.
Other matches
Detroit Red Wings 2-3 Florida Panthers
Chicago Blackhawks 2-0 Arizona Jackals
Calgary Flames 4-1 New York Islanders
Anaheim Ducks – San Jose Sharks – 5:4 Overtime
Sergei Bobrovsky’s 29 saves helped Florida beat Detroit, making the Russian goalkeeper the second star of the match.
Sergei Varlamov has saved 17 times against Calgary, but the Islanders, who had a very erratic season, were confidently defeated by the Lights. Among the winners, one of the goals was marked by Russian defender Nikita Zadorov.
Alexander Barabanov had an assist in the game against Anaheim, but his San Jose eventually lost the lead and lost in overtime.