Down a goal to what is likely the best team in the National Hockey League with just over a minute remaining in the third period, Nashville Predators head coach Barry Trotz made the decision to pull goaltender Pekka Rinne in favor of an extra attacker.
Soon thereafter, a loose puck found its way to center ice and a race toward Nashville's open net commenced. As the clock ticked down, Chicago’s Michael Frolik appeared to win that race for the puck, and sent a shot toward Nashville’s vacant cage.
After hauling tail from the right side of the ice inside of his own zone, Patric Hornqvist made a last-ditch dive and was able to knock the puck away to keep the score still within a manageable 1-0 lead for the Blackhawks. It goes without saying that if that puck went across the goal line, the game would have been effectively over at that point.
“Unbelievable,” Rinne said after the game. “You don’t see (that) too many times. He’s a winger, and comes back like that, catches their guy then dives and blocks the shot. It doesn’t matter how much there is left in the game, but that’s the kind of guy he is. He’s the ultimate team player and always plays his heart out.”
A postscript to the shot block was the fact that Hornqvist’s momentum carried him into the goalpost with such force that the net was knocked off of its moorings in the process.
The depleted corps of Predators forwards took another hit Saturday when center Paul Gaustad, who Trotz has leaned on for increased minutes in recent games, was scratched with an upper-body injury that will keep him out of the lineup for at least the next few games.
Nick Spaling inherited Gaustad’s spot as the center of the team’s first line. Usually playing in a more defensive role, Spaling was impressed, but not surprised, by the effort Hornqvist displayed in his effort to keep his team in the game.
“That play gave us a chance, gave us another chance,” Spaling said. “When you see a guy do that, it boosts you up. It would have been nice to capitalize on our opportunity from it.”
Hornqvist himself has had a couple of stints on injured reserve this season, but the guy only knows one way to play, and that way is definitely not with his own personal safety in mind.
“A good example of the effort was Patric Hornqvist coming back and giving us another chance to get it tied up,” Trotz said.
Trotz elected to utilize his timeout after the referee’s whistle blew the play dead. After the 30-second break had elapsed, Hornqvist skated right back out onto the ice.
Yes, the Predators never got the tying goal they were looking for. And yes, Saturday’s loss makes Nashville’s hopes of getting into the Western Conference’s top eight teams at the end of the regular season very slim. But the kind of effort that Hornqvist displayed on that play goes a lot further than the credit he received for a blocked shot on the game sheet.
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