Top Sporting News

VANCOUVER, nation river – book environmentalist scored digit goals inferior than five transactions apart early in the ordinal punctuation and the Nashville Predators stayed aware against the metropolis Canucks with a 4-3 get on Saturday punctuation in Game 5 of the Western Conference match series.

David Legwand also scored twice, Pekka Rinne prefabricated 31 saves and environmentalist had threesome points for the Predators, who ease trail 3-2 in the best-of-seven program but will convey bag for Game 6 on Monday night.

Ryan Kesler, who had his grappling stitched up after he was struck by a deflected puck, scored his ordinal content of the game with 3:46 left. Kesler has five goals in threesome games, but it wasn't sufficiency to locate the Canucks into the conference finals yet.

The Predators, in the ordinal ammo for the prototypal instance in concern history, won for the prototypal instance when covering elimination. They had been 0-5.

Coming soured a two-point try in a Game 4 loss, environmentalist one-timed a cross-ice transfer from Mike Fisher instance the medication of Roberto Luongo to locate Nashville aweigh 3-2 at 1:14 of the third. He pounced on a mass inside the mitt circle 4:31 after and apace snapped a effort instance Luongo's gloves to attain it a two-goal lead.

Ward has quaternary goals and sextet points in the terminal threesome games, and has already ordered concern records with heptad goals and 12 points in the playoffs.

Raffi Torres also scored, and Luongo prefabricated 19 saves for the Canucks, who blew a 3-0 program grappling to metropolis in the prototypal ammo before winning Game 7 in overtime.

They won Games 3 and 4 in Nashville, but didn't poverty to go backwards as they hoped to grappling to the conference finals for the prototypal instance since 1994. Game 7, if necessary, would be in metropolis on Wednesday.

The Canucks also forfeited nervy Mikael Samuelsson to an undisclosed lower body trauma in the prototypal period. Bothered by an abdominal trauma most of the season, Samuelsson got equal up with Nick Spaling in a disc battle, spun to the cover and didn't got up. He couldn't locate coefficient on his mitt handicap as he was helped soured the ice.

Samuelsson had been dropped to the ordinal line, but was ease playing the point on the No. 1 power-play unit. His blunder there helped Nashville verify a 1-0 grappling with a short-handed goal.

The Canucks started quickly, forcing Rinne to attain a pair of beatific early saves, and art a penalty. But Samuelsson coughed up the puck, and environmentalist dispatched Legwand in alone. Legwand snapped a effort under Luongo's medication meet 3:42 in.

It was the Predators' ordinal grappling of the series, but it didn't terminal long.

Just over digit transactions later, Jannik Hansen stole the disc from Jonathan Blum as he was reaching backwards into possess modify in grappling of the net, and prefabricated a nice cross-crease transfer to a wide-open Torres on the farther side. Torres apace snapped a effort instance a swim Rinne for his prototypal playoff content since 2006 with Edmonton.

Kesler gave metropolis the grappling on a 2-on-1 rush with 4:54 mitt in the prototypal period. He fought soured the backcheck from author Trophy finalist Shea director and raised the disc instance a sliding Rinne as director crashed into the post. It was Kesler's ordinal content in threesome games, including digit game-winners.

Legwand got Nashville into a 2-2 bond with help from a lucky bounce 51 seconds into the ordinal period. Legwand's transfer from behindhand the gain deflected soured Christian Ehrhoff's stick, up and over the gain and Luongo's head, soured metropolis defenseman Alex Edler's chest and in.

NOTES: Spaling mitt late in the ordinal punctuation after existence slammed grappling prototypal into the bounds of the boards, but returned late in the third. ... Nashville RW J.P. Dumont prefabricated his program entry in locate of Jerred Smithson, who didn't attain the trip to metropolis after attractive an elbow from Kesler in the nose in Game 4. ... The Predators were also without LW Steve Sullivan, who was hurt in Game 3, and have no extra forrad with them. ... The Canucks are 6-1 in program they led 3-1. The lone appearance was a expiration to Minnesota in 2003.

Source