The Arizona Coyotes secured a much needed 3-2 victory over the Nashville Predators as Clayton Keller willed his team to victory. 20240120_Tourigny_Postgame_FTP Going into Saturday afternoon, the Coyotes were coming off of a three-game road trip where they performed well but only came away with three points. The Coyotes and the Predators are both close together in the Western Conference standings, so to say that this game was important is an understatement. After starting off a little bit slow, Arizona found their legs and Keller’s goal helped them gain a 1-0 lead after the first period. It was in the second period where the Coyotes played their best hockey. They dominated puck possession while playing with an uptempo style that completely threw Nashville off guard. Keller scored his second goal of the game in this period which tied Jeremy Roenick for the fourth most goals in Coyotes franchise history. “No not at all,” Keller said on if he thinks about these sorts of records. “I mean not until number one. It’s been great playing here. I’ve played with so many great players, great coaches, the training staff, the equipment guys, they have all sacrificed so much for me and couldn’t be more thankful for them. Right now the most important thing is getting this team to the playoffs and playing meaningful games and fighting hard until the end.” Michael Carcone found the back of the net in the second period, scoring his first goal since December 11. This was a win that the Coyotes desperately needed. They fought hard and played an overall very complete game despite some things not necessarily being in their favor. “Oh badly,” André Tourigny said on how much they needed a win. “We’ve played well lately and you look at our record and have nothing to show for it, so at some point you need to have something to show for it. To be honest it was a really tough game. I think our guys really dug deep. “The travel, we arrived home around 5 AM. Yesterday was a day of recovery but still a really tough day, you skip a night basically. Today playing at 1pm, I really felt our guys digging in. It was not energy wise easy and I was really proud of how the guys reacted and dug deep.” With Nick Schmaltz out, Keller played a total of 23:43 minutes and was the leading catalyst in this victory. He was all over the ice throughout the contest and Tourigny was impressed with the way his All-Star performed. “Keller through these certain number of games has really played his best hockey,” Tourigny said. “I had a discussion with him yesterday and I really think he got his game to another level. When you use a player like that it creates bad habits. I don’t plan to do that for a long time… Today I give him a lot of credit for the last few games. I used him a lot, he dug deep, played a really solid game, scored two goals, but more than that he played good. I want to give him a lot of ice time but not that much.” Due to the weight of this game held, it almost felt like the playoffs and Arizona delivered in a huge way. With the Western Conference wild card race continuing to get tougher and tougher, it will take these kinds of performances for the Coyotes to remain afloat. The Coyotes return to action on Monday night as they face the Pittsburgh Penguins at Mullett Arena.
