Nashville Predators: Four Things to Watch For over Final 20 Games
Can John Hynes Secure Another Year as Head Coach for Nashville?
This is the most obvious question to ask ourselves down the stretch. Will this team show enough development and fortitude to prove to newly hired General Manager Barry Trotz that Hynes deserves the final year of his two-year deal he received last summer?
The important thing here is the Predators can’t just completely fold and show no fight down the stretch. They’re going to be significant underdogs on paper alone in a lot of their upcoming matchups. What can work in Hynes’ favor of keeping his job another year is if the team pulls off some upsets and rallies to make things interesting.
On the flip side, if the team stunts in their growth and morale drops, it will be hard to justify keeping Hynes around any longer after trading away so many core player to begin with.
It never really made sense to fire Hynes in the middle of the season. It wouldn’t have accomplished much unless there was already a head coach you just couldn’t resist hiring as soon as possible. Not sure that head coach is out there, but Milwaukee Admirals head coach Karl Taylor seems to be the leading candidate.
If the Nashville Predators can win more games than they lose over the last 20, I’ll consider that a small victory for Hynes and his coaching staff when you consider so much youth and inexperience has been thrown into heavy NHL minutes, not to mention navigating the injuries to key players.
Hynes’ win-loss record as head coach for the Nashville Predators is 123-88-17 for a point percentage of .577. Considerably higher than his point percentage in five seasons with the New Jersey Devils (.487).
It’s the dismal performances his teams have shown in the playoffs over his head coaching career that is the major blemish to his resume. It seems very unlikely that Hynes makes it to next season as head coach of the Predators.
#2: Are the Nashville Predators Improving in Key Areas?
This is something I’ve been watching closely post-trade deadline. Are the Nashville Predators making any strides in some of the areas that they’ve struggled in badly over the course of the first 62 games?
Unfortunately, it was a giant step back in the last game as the Arizona Coyotes got the best of the Nashville Predators again, holding Nashville to one goal and an 0-for-6 evening on the power play.
When you look at the losses of Filip Forsberg, Ryan Johansen, Mikael Granlund and Juuso Parssinen to the power play unit as of late, it’s hard to know exactly what the potential could end up being.
Obviously Granlund has been traded away, and Johansen is out for the season. If Forsberg ends up coming back into the lineup, which remains unclear if he will, then perhaps we can get a better look at these newly-constructed power play units that have included Luke Evangelista.
The Predators power play has remained way down the list of power play percentage all season, and sit at 25th currently with an 18.5 percent success rate. A significant drop from their 24.4 percent success rate last season that finished sixth in the NHL.
Even if it’s modest improvement, watch this area closely over the final 20 games to see if they can make some strides.
Defensive structure is important as well, and it has shown some flashes of strong play on the puck, but also some glaring lapses. Again, this is to be expected with so many new players in the lineup and losing so many veterans all in a month’s timespan.
The defensive pairings have gone through major changes and it’s taking time to get the chemistry down. Losing the on-ice leadership of Mattias Ekholm isn’t something you’re going to overcome in short time, even though Tyson Barrie has looked pretty good offensively.
Alexandre Carrier, another vital piece that wasn’t lost by trade but by injury, has been hard make up for.
I’m keying in on how the Nashville Predators look at becoming a team that’s a menace to play against like they used to be. A team that doesn’t get pushed around and wins those critical loose puck battles. Haven’t seen enough of that as of late.
#3: The Future of the Nashville Predators is NOW
This is the one everyone is most excited about; watching the young players on this team get increased roles and hopefully bring a new brand of hockey to Smashville.
No one is raising the excitement level more right now than Luke Evangelista, the former 2nd-round pick in the 2020 NHL Entry Draft is got his NHL call-up way sooner than expected. Not because he wasn’t deserving, but just because this large of a sell-off was something that David Poile seemed like he would never fully commit to.
In just his fourth NHL game, Evangelista scored two goals and registered six shots on net to fuel a Predators third period comeback against Vancouver.
Evangelista is also getting the opportunity with the injuries to Forsberg, Johansen and Parssinen. Once Forsberg returns, if he does at all, then we’ll see if Evangelista stick around the NHL lineup or goes back to Milwaukee.
It doesn’t stop at Evangelista, however. Of course the hope is that Parssinen gets back into the lineup and continues what has been an outstanding rookie campaign with 23 points in 42 games. He should be close to returning, so watching how he performs to close out the regular season will be under the spotlight.
Cody Glass and Tommy Novak shouldn’t be overlooked in all of this, either. They’ve made it clear they’re here to stay on the NHL level, so let’s see if they finish out the season on a strong note. They’ve gotten better and better as the season has gone on.
And then you have Philip Tomasino. Another player that is a major part of the future and how the “reset” goes. A lot of us can live with missing the playoffs if we’re seeing Tomasino and the other previously mentioned are being put in position to continue their development into next season.
Tomasino has six points in 11 games since getting the call-up after the Forsberg injury.
#4: How Will the Starts be Sorted out for Juice and Lanky?
Kevin Lankinen was re-signed to another one-year deal when the thought was he might be traded at the deadline. Lankinen gets a bump from $1.5M to $2M for the 2023-24 season as Juuse Saros‘ backup.
Lankinen has no doubt earned it, and he’ll get plenty more starts to close out this current season. The Predators have five more back-to-back scenarios remaining on their schedule, and a lot of games crammed in between.
The Predators don’t have more than one day off between games until the final week of the regular season. Lankinen and Saros should split the starts down the stretch and not just start Lankinen on back-to-backs.
If the Predators are going to quickly move through what they’re calling a “reset” and remain competitive into 2023-24, then obviously Saros and Lankinen will have to be one of the better goaltending duos in the NHL.
Next. Nashville Predators Trade Deadline Grades. dark
This is also why I can’t completely write off the Predators from making the playoffs with 20 games remaining. If both Saros and Lankinen can hit their own hot streaks and steal some wins, then maybe the Predators can go somewhere in the neighborhood of winning 13 or 14 games and keeping the postseason streak alive.
More than anything, goal support has to get much better and that’s a tall order with so much roster turnover and sorting things out. Either way, I’ll be watching closely to see how Saros and Lankinen finish what has been a rollercoaster 2022-23 season for the Nashville Predators.
The Nashville Predators continue their long road trip with a matchup against the LA Kings. The Predators have been away from home the entire month of March going 2-1-1.