Roman Josi had a goal and two assists and Juuse Saros made 32 saves to lead the Nashville Predators to their fifth straight victory, 3-2, over the visiting Winnipeg Jets on Sunday night.
It was the first three-point game of the season for Josi, who joined Filip Forsberg (37) as just the second player in Predators history with 30 career three-point games. Yakov Trenin and Gustav Nyquist also scored for Nashville.
Josh Morrissey and Cole Perfetti scored and Laurent Brossoit made 23 saves for Winnipeg, which had a five-game win streak snapped and lost for just the second time in 10 games.
The Jets, trying to sweep a three-game road trip that began Wednesday with a 3-2 overtime win at Tampa Bay followed by a 3-0 shutout of Florida on Friday, started strong, peppering Saros with 11 of the first 12 shots of the game, many of them grade-A, over the first nine minutes but failed to score.
Nashville rebounded to take a 1-0 lead with just 18.9 seconds left when Trenin tapped in a rebound of a Josi shot from the left wing for his fourth goal in the last five games.
Josi made it 2-0 at the 1:26 mark of the second period when his sharp-angle shot from the bottom of the left circle squeezed past Brossoit for his fourth goal of the season.
The Predators extended the lead to 3-0 at the 6:22 mark with a power-play goal. Forsberg fired a seam pass from the top of the left circle through traffic to Nyquist, who redirected it inside the far left post for his third goal of the season.
The Jets had a chance to cut into the lead twice during the period, but Saros made a pair of blocker saves on breakaways by Mark Scheifele and Kyle Connor.
Winnipeg finally broke through midway through the third period with two goals in the span of 42 seconds. Morrissey got the first at the 10:28 mark when he chipped in a shot from the left circle for his fourth goal of the campaign. Perfetti followed with a power-play goal, his seventh goal of the season, with a wrist shot from the high slot that caromed in off the inside the left post.
The Jets nearly tied it with 2:34 remaining but Saros gloved a point-blank wrist shot by Vladislav Namestnikov.
--Field Level Media
Winnipeg | Nashville | |
Josh Morrissey 1 | Points | Roman Josi 3 |
Josh Morrissey 1 | Goals | Roman Josi 1 |
Kyle Connor 1 | Assists | Roman Josi 2 |
Cole Perfetti 1 | Power Play Goals | Gustav Nyquist 1 |
N/A | Short Handed Goals | N/A |
Laurent Brossoit .885 | Save Percentage | Juuse Saros .941 |
Laurent Brossoit 23 | Saves | Juuse Saros 32 |
Team | Shots | Goals | Power Play | Penalty Kill | Penalty Mins | Face Offs Won |
Winnipeg | 34 | 2 | 1-2 | 1-2 | 4 | 35 |
Nashville | 26 | 3 | 1-2 | 1-2 | 4 | 35 |