Being the man in goal for the Nashville Predators has made for a good living for Pekka Rinne. His team plays tough defense in front of him and he’s already exceptionally talented.
It’s no wonder that while Rinne has fallen on hard times of late not looking like his other-worldly self that his teammates and coaches aren’t too concerned with seeing a few more pucks than usual get by him. Predators goalie coach Mitch Korn tells Joshua Cooper of The Tennessean there’s no reason to be alarmed with how Rinne is doing.
“There are ebbs and flows in the season kind of like you go through those stretches in life where today the dryer broke and yesterday the air conditioning didn’t go on and you had a flat tire,” Korn said on Friday. “It happens. If you sit down and look at it there have been some goofy things that have happened that not even a goalie like Patrick Roy would have stopped.”
Well, when you put it that way everyone can feel at ease when they have an off day.
Korn’s got it right though. All season long, Rinne has been outstanding and having a few games in a row that stink is just going to happen. Of course, you’d like to not have three out of seven shots from the Oilers get by you or see the Penguins put a five spot up, but that’s how it goes sometimes.
That said, if the Predators are going to lay claim to fourth in the West, beating Winnipeg and Chicago this weekend would be a good way to snap to it and Rinne (along with Anders Lindback) will have to be on top of it to make it happen.
