{"id":597581,"date":"2026-04-10T09:15:10","date_gmt":"2026-04-10T09:15:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/597581\/"},"modified":"2026-04-10T09:15:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-10T09:15:10","slug":"mammoth-defeat-predators-clinch-1st-playoff-berth-in-2nd-season","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/597581\/","title":{"rendered":"Mammoth defeat Predators, clinch 1st playoff berth in 2nd season"},"content":{"rendered":"

Haula cut the deficit to 4-1 with a power-play goal at 10:22. Zachary L’Heureux<\/a>\u00a0slid the puck through Vejmelka’s pads as he attempted at the left post and Haula backhanded it into an open net from the crease.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don’t think we played our best tonight,\u201d Nashville forward Ryan O’Reilly<\/a>\u00a0said. \u201cWe didn’t play that playoff style that we’ve been having success with \u2026 We kind of had a little momentum there and didn’t capitalize on it, which maybe could have sparked us. We didn’t build the game the way we needed to.\u201d<\/p>\n

Utah joined a list of teams in the post-expansion era (excluding teams that joined in 1967-68) to reach the postseason within its first two NHL seasons. The Oilers and Golden Knights both went two-for-two, while the Hartford Whalers (now Carolina), Quebec Nordiques (now Colorado), Atlanta Flames (now Calgary) and Kraken all qualified once.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we’ve been playing meaningful hockey for a while now,” Crouse said. “So, these are the games we want to be in. These are the games that we want to get up for. So it’s been a lot of fun.\u201d<\/p>\n

Predators captain Roman Josi<\/a>\u00a0was a late scratch before the game and is listed as day to day with an upper-body injury.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cHe’s impossible to replace,\u201d Brunette said. \u201cI thought the kids played well. (Oesterle) came in and gave us some good minutes and\u00a0Ufko’s getting better every game and it’s nice to see (Wilsby). There is more ice time for them. I thought they handled it pretty well.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

NOTES: Keller (15 points; four goals, 11 assists) and Guenther (12 points; five goals, seven assists) each extended their point streaks to six games and have combined for 27 points over that stretch. … Schmaltz extended his point streak to six games (five goals, four assists). … Cooley has 11 points (six goals, five assists) in a six-game streak. … Keller is just the third American in the NHL\u2019s modern era (since 1943-44) to captain a franchise to its first-ever Stanley Cup Playoffs berth. The others: Ron Langway (Washington in 1982-83) and Dave Christian (Winnipeg in 1981-82). … Mammoth defenseman Mikhail Sergachev<\/a>\u00a0has 11 assists in his past six games. … Predators forward Luke Evangelista<\/a>\u00a0left the game with 1:36 left the game in the third period after getting his face hit into the boards by Sergachev. Brunette did not have an update on his status after the game.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Haula cut the deficit to 4-1 with a power-play goal at 10:22. Zachary L’Heureux\u00a0slid the puck through Vejmelka’s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":597582,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[64,63,575,85],"class_list":["post-597581","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/597581","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=597581"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/597581\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/597582"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=597581"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=597581"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=597581"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}