It was a tale of two goalies at Jobing.com Arena on Tuesday night. Both Ilya Bryzgalov and Pekka Rinne came in riding hot streaks, but only one showed up for Tuesday's contest between the Phoenix Coyotes and the Nashville Predators.
Now the Preds are not, by any means, an offensive team. They rank highly in defensive stats, but lack in offense, quite similar to what they Coyotes are hoping to establish with their plethora of defensemen. Phoenix made Nashville look like offensive juggernauts on Tuesday.
Two early breakdowns led to Predators goals eight seconds apart in the first period. Those two, however, the Yotes were able to recover from, with Radim Vrbata and Lee Stempniak bringing the Coyotes back to a tie game.
The second period saw a few chances for the Coyotes, including a Lauri Korpikoski chance in which he beat Rinne, but flicked the puck wide of the net. J.P. Dumont took advantage of Phoenix's miscues on offense.
After netting one of two Nashville goals in the first, Dumont tickled the twine with a pair in the second for his fourth career hat trick. Patric Hornqvist added the fifth goal for Nashville, giving them five on just 21 shots.
The box score for the Coyotes wasn't pretty following the loss. Six players finished with at least a minus-2, including defenseman Michal Rozsival, who was getting his first action as a Coyote.
Despite the poor plus/minus, the Coyotes still had chances to win it against the Preds. They outshot their visitors from the Music City by a 34-21 clip, but, similar to Monday, could not convert against a hot goaltender.
It seems when it rains it pours for the Coyotes. After heating up, they've lost back-to-back games on back-to-back nights. They'll look for a quick turnaround against the division rival Kings in Los Angeles on Thursday.