Saros, Josi Lead Preds to Victory Over Penguins

Juuse Saros made 35 saves, Roman Josi dished out three assists and the Nashville Predators defeated the Pittsburgh Penguins by a 4-1 final on Tuesday night at Bridgestone Arena. The result gives the Preds wins in five of their last six outings and bumps them up to third place in the Central Division with 74 points and their 35th victory of the campaign.
Mattias Ekholm, Tanner Jeannot, Eeli Tolvanen and Yakov Trenin all found the back of the net for Nashville, and Josi continued to pad his scoring lead among all NHL blueliners with 69 points.

The Preds and Penguins were just 1.5 seconds away from entering the first intermission with a 0-0 draw, but a nifty passing play finished with Filip Forsberg finding Ekholm streaking in from the point, and the blueliner potted his fourth of the season to give Nashville the game's first lead.
Jake Guentzel evened the score with exactly six minutes to play in the second stanza, but in a matter of three minutes, the Preds tallied twice. First, Jeannot tipped in a Josi point shot at 15:40, and then Tolvanen converted on a breakaway and beat Casey DeSmith to give Nashville a 3-1 advantage through two periods.
Pittsburgh's best stretch came in the final frame, but Saros stopped all 13 shots he faced, and Trenin finished off the night with an empty-netter to help the Preds leapfrog the Minnesota Wild and jump into the top three spots in the division.
Josi recorded his 50th assist of the season and became just the third Predators player to reach the mark in a campaign, joining Paul Kariya (54 in 2005-06 & 52 in 2006-07) and Ryan Johansen (50 in 2018-19). Josi has also now established career highs in goals (17), assists (52) and points (69) this season.

Tuesday Storyline:

Josi was great again, Saros was even better, and the Predators found a way to earn two points once more and succeed against a formidable foe.
And while that defenseman and netminder helped lead the way, the Preds received contributions throughout the lineup on Tuesday night to top one of the best teams in the East and earn another satisfying win.
"It was a hard-fought battle," Preds Head Coach John Hynes said. "I just have a lot of respect for the way that our guys have dug in and competed and remained focused, and they're ready for the games. They've met the challenges of each game, but they've also met the challenges within each game when we get tested on our areas that we can improve upon. So, a lot of respect for the way that our guys have competed, and tonight was a hard-fought battle and we found a way to win."

"They're a good team over there, and when we win like that, it's always a great feeling," Ekholm said. "I think we took maybe a little bit too much water in the third, and we'll be trying to manage that going forward, but other than that, it was a great win for us."
Saros was a key cog in Nashville's stand in that final frame, and after receiving a night off in Minnesota, the goaltender responded with one of his better outings in recent memory - certainly worthy of another round of praise.
"He's awesome," Ekholm said of Saros. "Every night it's the same thing - he just stands in there for us and everything you throw at him, it doesn't matter, he's there for us. He's a huge part of every night, and I can't say enough good things about him."
"It's obviously fun when it's a tight race toward the playoffs," Saros said. "Every point matters. So, it's exciting, but it's also more fun. You've just got to stay with it."
The Predators did just that, and in the second period after Pittsgurgh evened the score, Nashville responded with two more - a tip from Jeannot and a well-deserved breakaway from Tolvanen - to go up for good.
"We just weren't going to be denied in that second period," Ekholm said. "We got those two goals, and it feels like in these kinds of games, they're hard with tight checking, and sometimes it's just like - on the third goal, you think that pass from Roman might not be the greatest and then it ends up as a breakaway. So, it's kind of flukey, but a big goal at the time and we'll take it. When it comes down to these teams that check really well and it's tight - it's not like it's 2-on-1's every other minute - and then those kind of flukey goals happen. Again, we found a way to get the win and a huge kudos to us for doing that."

Ekholm called the result a "hard win," and while no game is ever easy, Nashville's outings as of late have all carried a bit of extra gumption with the need to grind things out more often than not. The Preds have risen to the occasion in five of their last six in that regard, exactly what they want to see with just over 20 games remaining over the course of seven weeks to go in the regular season.
"From now on, they're all going to be hard wins," Jeannot said. "Everyone's digging in for playoff time coming up at the end of the year here. Each game is going to get harder and harder, and we've just got to keep developing our game and work towards that."
"The teams we've played have been hard, and these games have been so hard to play in, and the team just responds," Ekholm said. "I feel like we grow with challenges - like the harder the team that we're playing plays, the harder we play and the harder we come to battle. The response of every single guy out there has been tremendous… But we have guys throughout the lineup that contribute every night, and the way we've been battling lately has been awesome to see."

Highlight of the Night:

They Said It:

Mattias Ekholm on Roman Josi:
"He's on his own page. It's crazy. He's so good. And as I said, that third goal, that's when you know you're having a year when that becomes an assist. I don't know how many games he's won for us this year, and he keeps proving to everybody that he's the best defenseman in the League, and I would say so. And offensively he's been lights out all year. So, he's a huge part of our success."

Notes:

Tanner Jeannot recorded his fourth game-winning goal of 2021-22. The only Predators rookie with more in a single season is Filip Forsberg (6) in 2014-15.
Predators defenseman Matt Benning did not play on Tuesday and is day-to-day with an upper-body injury. Blueliner Mark Borowiecki (day-to-day, lower-body) was also absent, and forward Matt Luff was scratched.
Nashville will now head on the road for a single matchup in Philadelphia against the Flyers before returning home to host Toronto on Saturday.