The Nashville Predators completed a stunning sweep of the Chicago Blackhawks in the National Hockey League playoffs on Thursday.
Nashville will face the victor of the St. Louis-Minnesota series in the second round.
The Pegulas fired GM Tim Murray and head coach Dan Bylsma on Thursday. After all, the Blackhawks finished the regular season with 109 points, the most in the Western Conference and third-most in the National Hockey League. But it looks as if age might be catching up to some of the team's most important pieces, and several of its best young players flopped in the postseason this year.
All 12 ESPN NHL contributors had Chicago winning the first round series. For the series, the 34-year-old goaltender stopped 123 of the 126 shots he's faced. He picked a great time for his first career overtime goal in the playoffs, scoring with 5:38 remaining in Game 5's extra frame to put the Canadiens in a 3-2 hole.
"That was tough with all that travel previous year, I remember it pretty clearly", center Ryan Johansen said Sunday. One of their depth forwards, Sissons scored in Game 2 and victimized the Blackhawks with a timely goal just when they were putting serious pressure on Rinne.
"The one thing that I know for sure is that when we wake up tomorrow morning, we're hardly into this", Predators coach Peter Laviolette said.
"I've got to get back to playing more puck possession, a little bit more speed on the rush", he said. But they have five long months - more time than they ever expected or wanted - to figure it out before training camp opens in September. The Blues won two of three games played in St. Louis, and they will have home-ice advantage in this semifinal after edging out Nashville for third in the Central.
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Nashville extended the lead to 2-0 with a freaky goal at 8:52 of the third.
There are many questions without answers of how the Blackhawks will bounce back from back-to-back early playoff exits, but if their track record (from owner Rocky Wirtz all the way down to the last man on the roster) has shown us anything, it's that it will take a lot to slam the door and keep it shut on the guys wearing the indian-head sweaters.
He said most of the right things.
Dubnyk's second playoff shutout came nearly two years to the day of his first, also against the Blues on April 20, 2015. Both Allen and Pekka Rinne of the Predators entered the first round with much to prove, given previous playoff inconsistencies, and both helped rewrite their own playoff narrative.
Chicago avoided the shutout when Toews scored at 14:42 of the third for his first postseason goal since Game 4 of the 2015 Stanley Cup Final.
"You saw what they did to Chicago", Allen said. They came close a year ago before losing a seventh game to the San Jose Sharks. Nashville LW Colin Wilson (lower-body injury) and RW Craig Smith were scratched. He's hopeful to return against the Blues.
If you're new to Wheaton's campus this year, or even last year, you might find this hard to believe: The Cubs were not the team that got Chicago excited until, well, this past October. "It was nice to see the boys do real well and get me the opportunity to get back in".
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