All eyes in Nashville have been on the Predators’ big offseason acquisitions, Steven Stamkos and fellow forward Jonathan Marchessault.
Not just the fans. But also, it seems, their teammates.
“We’ve added some really good scorers, and I think we are deferring too much to them at times,” Predators coach Andrew Brunette said after a 3-0 loss Saturday at the Detroit Red Wings.
“We’re trying to be cuter when we need to be harder, and as we all know in this league, it is usually harder that wins, not cuter.”
The Predators will try to rectify that Tuesday when they open a four-game homestand against the Seattle Kraken.
Nashville put 42 shots on net but all of them were stopped by Cam Talbot, who was making his first start for the Red Wings.
“It’s frustrating,” Predators forward Ryan O’Reilly said. “We did some good things well and still have things to improve on, but we need to score some goals. And I know for myself, (we’re) usually winning some more battles in front of the net.
“… We all know we have to be better in front of the net and make it more difficult on whatever goalie we’re playing. But (there were) some good things. You know the effort’s there, guys are trying to do the right things. It’s just going to be hard to get to where we want to be.”
Juuse Saros made 19 saves for Nashville after missing the team’s 4-3, season-opening home loss to the Dallas Stars last Thursday because of a lower-body injury.
Forward Filip Forsberg played in his 700th career game for the Predators on Saturday, becoming just the sixth player in franchise history to reach that mark. The others are David Legwand, Roman Josi, Shea Weber, Martin Erat and Mattias Ekholm.
It will be the third game in four days for the Kraken, who beat the host Minnesota Wild 5-4 in a shootout Saturday and suffered a 2-0 defeat Sunday at Dallas.
“Although it’s a back-to-back and you might be tired, it is Game 3 (of the season). There should be no excuse, especially going against a team like Dallas, who’s a top-end team in the West,” Kraken defenseman Brandon Montour said.
“Especially as a team that’s looking to get over the hump and get a good run in the playoffs. That’s one that you should just kind of be up for, in a sense.
“(Sunday’s) game got away from us with simple, simple plays that could have been avoided. It’s little things. I think our team needs to learn, there are a little plays, whether it’s when you’re going back into the D-zone or we got a fast team, we’ve got to move our feet and create (offense) that way … it’s easy stuff that we can fix.”
Stars backup goaltender Casey DeSmith stopped all 25 of Seattle’s shots.
“We didn’t really generate much into the third period,” Kraken defenseman Adam Larsson said. “That’s where we have to make a push, a strong push, to win the game. We have to be better … we have something really good going, we have an energized group, even (Sunday). We just have to keep working.”
Seattle played Dallas without defenseman Vince Dunn, who suffered an upper-body injury Saturday at Minnesota and is listed as day-to-day.
–Field Level Media
