NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Alexandre Carrier scored with 7.9 seconds remaining in the third period, and the Nashville Predators beat the New York Islanders 3-1 on Saturday night.
Luke Evangelista and Juuso Parssinen also scored in Nashville’s third win in four games. Juuse Saros made 24 stops.
“It was sort of a playoff-like atmosphere on a Saturday,” Nashville coach Andrew Brunette said. “The Islanders are a hard team to play against. They don’t give you a lot of room and make you earn everything. Tonight was a good battle test for us.”
Jean-Gabriel Pageau scored and Ilya Sorokin made 25 saves for the Islanders, who have dropped three of four.
With time winding down in the third, Carrier’s slap shot went off the stick of Islanders defenseman Scott Mayfield and over Sorokin’s shoulder.
“Great forecheck by our forwards and they created a turnover by their D,” Carrier said. “Great bounce, but sometimes you’ve just got to put it on net and good things happen.”
Saros is 7-1-0 in his career against the Islanders.
Parssinen added an empty-netter with 1 second remaining.
After two scoreless periods, Pageau found the back of the net 12 minutes into the third when he deflected Noah Dobson’s shot by Saros.
“We played a pretty solid road game for most of it,” Dobson said. “We’ve got to manage the moments better, especially the last five minutes there. We’ve got to at least get that to overtime and get a point out of it. It’s disappointing.”
Evangelista tied it with 4:52 remaining with a power-play wrist shot from the right circle.
“I saw a lane from a little higher out, and I just decided to rip it and it ended up going in,” Evangelista said. “(It’s) a really good feeling.”
New York’s Brock Nelson played his 800th career game.
