After a 4-1 loss Thursday night, Nashville heads to Dallas to try again against the Stars.
The Predators have a chance to exact revenge after the Stars ruined Nashville's home opener defeating the Preds 4-1 at Bridgestone Arena. Tonight the teams face off at American Airlines Arena, and Nashville needs to make some adjustments to be competitive in the second half of this home and away.
Generating solid offensive chances will be key in a bounce back game for Nashville. The Preds lines struggled to generate quality chances on Thursday night against the Stars.
"We just didn’t have much," John Hynes said after Thursday's game. "I mean there really wasn’t a line tonight that you said was our best line."
The solution to offensive production may not be complicated. After the loss, Mattias Ekholm expressed the need to keep things simple on the ice.
"At times I think we may have been a bit too cute out there doing too much. At times it looks good when you're circling around the zone, but you don’t get the shots. You don’t get the opportunities."
Dallas goaltender Jake Oettinger played a great first game of the season Thursday, earning a .969 save percentage and stopping 31 of 32 shots. Nashville's lines need improved traffic in front of the net and in Oettinger's line of sight tonight to challenge the young netminder. The Predators lone goal on Thursday was a tip in by Ryan Johansen. Redirects and physical net front presence are opportunities Nashville will need to create.
The other improvement is a little harder to quantify, but John Hynes referred to the lack of "juice" in Thursday's contest.
"I just didn’t see the usual juice and spark that we play with," Hynes said."The guys put the effort in but we just didn’t have the same juice that we’d normally be able to play with."
While it may be hard to describe or quantify, that juice or spark was obviously missing with the team on Thursday. Communication on lines and defensive pairings will be key tonight for the Predators. Having the team firing with that spark will improve everything from passing to zone exits to defensive help in front of Juuse Saros.
Nashville faces off against the Stars at 7:00 pm CT at American Airlines Arena. The game will be broadcast on Bally Sports South and 102.5 The Game will have the call.
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