|
 One might have an idea of what it was like to see Martin Brodeur
donning the uniform of a team other than the New Jersey Devils
Thursday night in Bridgestone Arena.
Brodeur's 1,260th career game came in the garb of the St. Louis
Blues. But it wasn't his 689th win or 125th shutout, as the
Nashville Predators took advantage of a spate of defensive errors to
claim a 4-3 win and first place in the Central Division.
Center Mike Ribeiro scored a goal and helped on two others for
Nashville (17-6-2), which improved to 11-1-1 at home, 10 of those
wins by one goal. A Montrealer like Brodeur, Ribeiro was honored to
beat him with a wrister at 1:25 of the second period.
"It was pretty cool," said Ribeiro, who shared a few words with
Brodeur during warmups. "Even before games, he's pretty relaxed. I
tell him before every game, 'You're still pretty good, you can let
me have one.' It's always fun to score against one of the toughest
goalies ever."
Brodeur stopped 20 of 24 shots, but his performance appeared much
better than an .833 save percentage suggested. The 42-year old made
four quality stops in the first 10 minutes, stoning center Colin
Wilson on a breakaway in the first minute.
But Wilson got a second chance after a failed pinch sent him into
the zone cleanly off a pass by center Calle Jarnkrok. Wilson buried
it at 9:30 of the third period, giving the Predators what turned out
to be the winning goal.
"If I stop that one, that might be the difference," said Brodeur,
absolving his teammates of the blame. "We played decent, but the one
breakaway got away from me. We made a few mistakes and they took big
advantage of them."
Ribeiro was involved in Nashville's first three goals, setting up
the first two after helping create neutral-zone turnovers.
After center Jori Lehtera gave the puck away to Ribeiro, rookie
center Filip Forsberg pounced on the rebound of Ribeiro's backhander
for his 11th goal at 14:10 of the first period, tying the score at
1.
Moments after serving an offensive-zone minor for hooking, Ribeiro
fed left winger Eric Nystrom for a one-timer at 19:07 of the first,
giving the Predators the lead for good at 2-1.
Ribeiro then finished off an impressive tic-tac-toe play, converting
left winger James Neal's feed for his eighth goal of the season and
his third in as many games.
[to top of second column] |
"We did a good job forcing turnovers and you can counterattack
off that," Ribeiro said. "When we do that, that's when we spend a
lot of time in the offensive zone."
Right winger Vladimir Tarasenko scored twice for St. Louis (16-8-2),
giving him 16 on the season, and left winger Jaden Schwartz pulled
the Blues within 4-3 at 12:32 of the third period with a wrister
from the right faceoff circle.
But Nashville goalie Pekka Rinne (17-4-1) didn't allow an equalizer,
denying center Patrik Berglund's knuckling slapper with 1:13
remaining and turning away right winger T.J. Oshie on a snap shot
with 34 seconds on the clock.
Rinne finished with 29 saves and moved ahead of Vancouver's Ryan
Miller for the NHL lead in wins.
Brodeur couldn't add to his NHL all-time record, although coach Ken
Hitchcock didn't blame him for the defeat.
"Marty's fine," Hitchcock said. "We can't make those mistakes and we
making too many of them in critical ice. When you make the big
mistakes we are making on our half of the red line, it costs us."
NOTES: St. Louis LW Alexander Steen became the fourth NHL forward
this season to eclipse eight minutes of power-play time and 1:30 of
short-handed action in a game Wednesday night with marks of 8:08 and
1:33 at Chicago. ... LW James Neal took six shots in the third
period of Tuesday night's 2-1 loss in Carolina, the highest
single-period total for a Nashville player since RW Patric
Hornqvist's franchise-record eight in the third period on Feb. 18,
2013, in Colorado. ... The Blues entered the game with a shot
differential of plus-114, third best in the NHL. ... Predators C
Derek Roy (upper-body injury) sat out his third consecutive game.
[© 2014 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.]
Copyright 2014 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
 |
