The Sunday nightcap of the Stanley Cup Playoffs featured the Nashville Predators and Vancouver Canucks debuting their first-round series. It was an appropriately close, emotional battle, one the Canucks took 4-2, not without some difficulty.
Canucks Win Dog Fight Versus Predators
On paper, this may have been a matchup between one team – the Canucks – that won its division, and another – the Predators – that finished no better than fourth, but when the playoffs commence, everything is reset to zero. Game 1 was a tight-checking, defensive affair except for a brilliant 12-second flurry from Vancouver in the third period that paved the way to victory.
Nashville got on the board first in the opening stanza via a Jason Zucker wrister, only for the hosts to level the terms early in the middle frame thanks to an Elias Lindholm wrist shot. Still in the second, Ryan O’Reilly helped the Predators reclaim the advantage on the power play. Everything changed in the blink of an eye in the third period, however. Quinn Hughes and Dakota Joshua scored 12 seconds apart, flipping a 2-1 deficit into a 3-2 lead. From there Vancouver clamped down on defence, eventually sealing the deal when Dakota Joshua earned a brace with an empty netter. Thatcher Demko made 20 saves.
Related: 2024 Stanley Cup Playoffs Round 1 Hub
If Game 1 is any indication, this will be a physical chess match of a series. The teams go at it again in Game 2 on Tuesday night in Vancouver.