The Nashville Predators missed out on a golden opportunity to steal Game 5 in Carolina, with the Hurricanes being helped tremendously by a questionable penalty call in overtime.
After watching their 2-1 lead evaporate in the 3rd period when Martin Necas put home a wrap-around attempt, the Predators lost the game when Jordan Staal scored the game-winner in overtime, out-muscling Ryan Johansen for a bouncing puck in front of Juuse Saros.
But only moments before that, with the Preds on a power play, Hurricanes forward Sebastian Aho skated strategically into the legs of Predators defenseman Alex Carrier, drawing an interference call.
Aho making that second double check to make sure he was skating into Carrier at the right angle pic.twitter.com/Jj4lScOYPO
— angrypredsfan (@AngryPredsFan) May 26, 2021
Even with a questionable penalty negating a Preds power play in overtime, Nashville really missed a huge opportunity to steal Game 5.
First, they went up 1-0 on a tipped goal by Yakov Trenin, putting the Hurricanes on their heels early. Carolina would bounce back, getting a power play goal from Martin Necas less than three minutes later.
But then the Preds capitalized 53 seconds into the 2nd period when Colton Sissons found Trenin on a 2-on-1, who then beat Hurricanes goalie Alex Nedeljkovic on the near post to put the Preds up 2-1.
From there, the Preds put a solid neutral zone trap on the Hurricanes attack. Choking all points of entry on their own blueline, the Canes did not have much room to work into the Preds’ zone. That is until Necas sped through the defense and wrapped around the game tying goal with 7:05 left in regulation.
Now the Nashville Predators face an elimination game on Thursday in Nashville and their only path to winning the series lies in winning two straight over Carolina.
