The Nashville Predators fell to the New York Rangers by a 4-0 final on Sunday night at Madison Square Garden. The result gives the Preds a pair of losses in their back-to-back weekend set through New York.
“It’s a sequence of, I don't know how many minutes, but in the second, they get two, and the game kind of goes away from us there,” Preds forward Filip Forsberg said. “Obviously, the second period was a lot of prime chances. I think [Justus Annunen] has played unbelievable for us. And the third [period], I thought we gave it an honest chance. We were getting a lot of looks, but [Rangers goaltender Jonathan Quick] played great in it. And yeah, seems to be the way things are going.”
“We put ourselves in two bad positions there to start the game, and taking a penalty early, taking an early penalty in the second [period] and got us a little bit,” Preds Head Coach Andrew Brunette said. “Too many penalties at certain times, put a lot of pressure on our kill and lost a little momentum early, and then I thought we had some really good looks. But I think overall, as a group, it's been like this all year, especially the last stretch. We’re a little bit snake bitten, and it's hard for us to score right now.”
The Rangers took a 1-0 lead in the opening period when Artemi Panarin fired a slapper past Preds goaltender Justus Annunen, and New York added two more in the second stanza with goals from J.T. Miller and K’Andre Miller.
By the time the night was done, the Predators and Rangers were even on the shot count, 34-34, but Jonathan Quick stopped every shot he saw for New York, and the home team added one more before the final horn.
“I thought we had our opportunities for sure,” Brunette said. “I think if you don't score, it's hard to win in this League. I thought we had numerous really good looks, we're just having a hard time scoring right now.”
With the weekend set in New York complete, the Preds will now head to Boston to face the Bruins on Tuesday, and the visitors will simply hope to find the back of the net in their next outing.
“We’ve got to score a goal,” Forsberg said. “It sounds silly, but I don’t know how many times we’ve said this…but we’ve got to start there and see what happens.”
Notes:
The Predators dressed 11 forwards and seven defensemen against the Rangers with forward Fedor Svechkov serving as Nashville’s lone healthy scratch.
The Preds will now head to Boston ahead of their roadtrip finale against the Bruins on Tuesday night before returning home to host Seattle on Thursday.
