4-goal period leads to win
Whether it’s a bad habit or an entertaining vice is up to interpretation, but the Ducks know definitively that they can win even if they’re staring at a two-goal deficit after two periods.
Sunday night at Honda Center, Anaheim posted its NHL-best 11th victory when trailing after two, beating the Nashville Predators, 4-2, by scoring four times in the third against the usually superb goalie Pekka Rinne.
What appeared to be one of the flattest performances of the season — the Ducks managed just three secondperiod shots on goal —
quickly escalated into a thrill ride for the sellout crowd.
After a Ryan Getzlaf goal 2 minutes, 12 seconds into the third, the Ducks (4420-7) tied the score and took the lead in a 35-second stretch on goals by Kyle Palmieri and Nate Thompson (at 9:51).
“I don’t know what it is. We spot teams a couple goals — do the ol’ rope-a-dope — and come out in the third and take over,” Thompson said. “Don’t have an explanation for it, can’t keep doing this, but at the same time, it was a good character win for us.”
Palmieri rebounded a shot off Rinne from defenseman Hampus Lindholm, let a defenseman skate past him and beat Rinne high to his right to a sliver-like opening.
Fourth-line center Thompson scored his first goal since Dec. 13 off a neutral-zone turnover, firing high to Rinne’s right again.
Defenseman Cam Fowler added a power-play goal five minutes after Thompson’s, and the Ducks have now outscored foes 79-58 in the third this season.
“They picked up their game in the last 20 [minutes], and our response was not good,” Nashville Coach Peter Laviolette said as the Central Division co-leading Predators (43-21-7) suffered their eighth loss in 10 games. “We didn’t do anything. We didn’t skate. We didn’t get pucks deep. We were second to battles.
“Everybody’s got a pit in their stomach right now.”
The Ducks, meanwhile, upped their Pacific Division lead to 13 points, the Western Conference by two points and are 8-1 since the start of the 2012-13 season against a Nashville team also aspiring to a long playoff run.
Unmistakably, the Ducks let the visitors know they won’t be denied when they put their mind to it.
“We can be unstoppable,” forward Patrick Maroon said after assisting the Getzlaf and Fowler goals a game after being a healthy scratch. “Our forecheck is so dominant … we’re really good at that. We’ve just got to do that every single night.”
Anaheim’s difficulty in meeting energetic standards in the second period this season saw them fall behind 2-0 and fail to manage a shot on goal until 7:38 remained in the period.
Nashville forward Taylor Beck did the hockey equivalent of a give-and-go with teammate Gabriel Bourque, re-collecting the puck to bury a shot past Ducks goalie John Gibson 1:19 in.
Then, after a second Anaheim penalty in the second (kneeing on Matt Beleskey), Nashville defenseman Roman Josi sent a long shot that tipped off the stick of Ducks defenseman Francois Beauchemin and headed to the net just inside the post left of Gibson at 6:49.
The goalie stopped the other 25 shots for a second win in three days.
Rinne only had to deal with the three Ducks shots in the second during a 28second span.
Then, everything changed. Again.
“It’s something you want to have confidence in. You have to have the belief,” Fowler said.