Although their magic number is down to three, thanks to a Minnesota Wild regulation loss and a St. Louis Blues overtime one, the Preds were unable to clinch–or get themselves closer–tonight.
The desperate Islanders got out to a ferocious start, stifling the Preds’ offensive attempts while giving Kevin Lankinen a lot of work to do. As the period went on, the Preds started to break through into the offensive zone, while still struggling to get many really high-quality chances.
Nashville got lucky as Bo Horvat collected a great pass and rang iron on a breakaway with around five minutes left in the first. An unlucky giveaway for the Islanders with around one minute remaining gave the Preds their first really good offensive looks, as they swarmed around Semyon Varlamov, but he was able to handle the onslaught.
The second period featured more of the same, with the Preds unable to get much of anything done except in brief bursts. Filip Forsberg almost had a goal with eight minutes elapsed, but again Varlamov had the save, and the Islanders’ counterattack on the next shift ended in a goal on a beautiful Noah Dobson shot from the blue line. 1-0 Islanders, at 9:07 of the second.
A couple of minutes later, Alex Carrier took a slashing penalty. The Preds were able to kill it off, doing a good job at limiting the Islanders’ chances while they were shorthanded, and then went back on the attack themselves. A strong push led to Forsberg drawing a desperation penalty from Dobson, and Nashville got a look of its own with the skater advantage.
Kyle Palmieri had a pair of great chances off a shorthanded odd-man rush. While the Preds made it back to the offensive zone eventually, the Islanders continued their ferocious kill, and Dobson left the box with barely any stress for the fans at UBS Arena. The Preds tried to finish the period strong, but Varlamov kept them off the board.
Nashville started the third on the attack, and got another chance on the power play six minutes in when Luke Evangelista got taken to the ice by a high stick. Brock Nelson headed to the penalty box, the Isles got another good shorthanded chance, and the Preds were again unable to score, but they drew another penalty as that one expired.
Again the Isles killed off the penalty, and came back into the Preds’ zone. Another lucky post kept Mat Barzal from making it a two-goal game, but the Preds were still unable to solve Varlamov, despite their efforts. They had a spectacular flurry late, and pulled Kevin Lankinen–who’d been excellent–but no luck.
Palmieri scored into the empty net at 18:41, and while the Preds continued to try, they weren’t able to get even one, let alone two.