Game #49: Ducks vs. Predators Gameday Preview

The Ducks take on the Nashville Predators in the final game of a three-game homestand. They are coming off a 5-1 win against the Pittsburgh Penguins on Thursday. The Predators are coming off a 6-5 victory over the San Jose Sharks on Thursday.

“They were picked to be a Cup contender for a reason,” Ducks head coach Greg Cronin said of the Predators. “Marchessault, Stamkos Forsberg, that's about three of the best trio of players you're going to get up front and they're on a run here. They've won five in a row and seven of their last 10 and they're doing it through offense. They’re playing a real fast-paced, four-man attack game. They have the forwards to cycle pucks down low and maintain possession. The shot totals have gone up with that. They’ve been ripping a lot of shots at the net and their power play’s been really impressive the last two weeks or so, so we're going have our hands full off offensively.”

“They’re high-end talent guys,” Jacob Trouba said. “They’ve been going pretty good here the last ten games or so. I don't think you really look all the way back to the start of the season (when they were struggling), they've been a good team lately. These are dangerous guys that you’ve got to be beware of and play hard defensively.”

The Ducks’ win on Thursday snapped a four-game losing streak and was just their third win in the last 10 games. But they displayed many of the characteristics that Cronin wants to see on a regular basis in that game.

“We're trying to strike that balance between being purely a rush team and try to mix in some zone time. There’s been evidence of that throughout the year, last year and the last game. Pittsburgh had some of those long shifts in the second period that kind of kept us out of their zone. But I liked the way we played. We had plenty of odd-man rushes. We had breakaways.

“It's funny, those things. As you go deeper into the season, there's more credibility to certain things that happen during games. And it's strange because we have breakways every game, right? I've said this since November, we're one of the top teams in the league in breaking pucks out and doing those radical stretches. I think that's given us the ability to get out of our zone quickly and then use our speed and our skill to attack the offensive blue line.

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“What I really liked (about last game) was the first ten minutes, we were a little bit sleepy. (Pittsburgh) could have been up 3-0. We had multiple turnovers on our breakouts, ironically, that went right into the slot and Gibby made unbelievable saves. Then, after that 10-minute or 12-minute mark, I thought we took the game over. And I think that's the sign of a team that's understanding how to manage the game. There’s going to be moments in games every game where the team puts pressure on you and your goalie makes a big save or you get a big blocked shot. You’ve got to take that moment and convert it into an opportunity to kind of re-attack and I thought we did that.”

“‘Connected’ is a big word that we use here,” Trouba said. “I thought we did a good job of (being connected last game). When we play our game and we're kind of connected and playing hard and we do things we're supposed to do, we end up with a good result.”

Ducks Projected Lines

Trevor Zegras - Leo Carlsson - Alex Killorn
Frank Vatrano - Ryan Strome - Troy Terry
Cutter Gauthier - Mason McTavish - Robby Fabbri
Jansen Harkins - Isac Lundeström - Brett Leason

Jackson LaCombe - Radko Gudas
Pavel Mintyukov - Jacob Trouba
Brian Dumoulin - Drew Helleson

John Gibson (confirmed)

Predators Projected Lines

Filip Forsberg - Steven Stamkos - Jonathan Marchessault
Gustav Nyquist - Ryan O'Reilly - Vinnie Hinostroza
Tommy Novak - Fedor Svechkov - Zach L'Heureux
Cole Smith - Michael McCarron - Colton Sissons

Roman Josi - Justin Barron
Brady Skjei - Nick Blankenburg
Adam Wilsby - Luke Schenn

Juuse Saros (confirmed)