The Thrashers dropped their fourth exhibition game in four tries with a 4-3 loss to Nashville last night. It’s certainly disappointing to be 0-4, but it is still just the preseason and the final results of these games don’t really matter all that much. What does matter is how the team is starting to gel. “We want to win every game,” said head coach Craig Ramsay. “But more importantly we want to accomplish certain goals.”
Those goals include getting the defenseman to come up a little bit and join the rush. That definitely happened last night with the play of Zach Begosian and Freddie Meyer. Begosian finished with one assist and three shots in 18 minutes of ice time. Meyer played inspired hockey, especially after Atlanta went down 3-1. He was able to shoot a rocket past Nashville goalie Anders Lindback just 16 seconds later to make it 3-2. “Scoring helps your confidence and puts a jump in your step and we’ll try to carry that into this weekend,” Meyer said. The score put a jump in the Thrashers step right away and they tied the game less than three minutes later on a beautiful give-and-go goal by Ben Eager from Zach Begosian and Johnny Oduya. “It’s always important after the other team scores to have a big shift and get the forecheck going and hem them in and we were successful with that when we tied it back up,” added Meyer.
Nik Antropov was on the ice for the first time since his off-season hip surgery. Antropov was one of the leading scorers for the Thrash last year with 67 points (24 goals, 43 assists). It might take a little bit of time to get back into game shape, but he seems to be feeling good. “I feel better than I expected. Hip feels good, but my head is a little bit faster than my hip right now,” Antropov said. How long does it take to get over hip surgery? “Everybody’s different, I’ll tell you in mid-season or after the season,” concluded Antropov.
Goalie Chris Mason had some good and bad moments during the game. He allowed a couple easy goals that could have been stopped and he also made a few spectacular saves to keep Atlanta in the game. He finished the game with 26 saves on 30 shots, but he couldn’t stop the fourth goal that decided the game. “Unfortunately we didn’t get the win, but I think it’s encouraging that we scored some more goals tonight,” Mason said. “(During) training camp, you’ve got different guys playing in front of you and different guys playing every night, but I think they’re playing great and trying to work everything out.” The defensemen have been different from game to game during the preseason, but once the regular season starts those pairings will be set and that will make it easier for Mason to help win some games. “We’d like to be winning these games, but I think we’re improving and we’re learning.”
Towards the end of the game with Atlanta trailing 4-3, coach Ramsay called a timeout and drew up a play that looked like it went off without a hitch. Rich Peverely won the draw back to Begosian and the young defenseman let loose with a cannon of a shot, but unfortunately the goalie made a save and stopped the onslaught of Thrashers crashing the net. “Most teams are going to try to win the draw, go into the middle and shoot it,” said Ramsay. “We thought let’s just see if we could get them to jump out and get it right to the net and let our big people bang away at it. I think we had two shots where we blocked ourselves, when it goes to the net you have to get out of the way.” That situation will help the Thrashers when they undoubtedly face it again at some point during the regular season. “That was certainly our best effort, we got involved in the battle, we won the scrum and got our point shots. Those things pay off down the road,” concluded Ramsay.
The game last night concluded the home exhibition schedule and they will finish with road games against Carolina and Columbus this Friday and Saturday. Atlanta will have played the same three opponents (Columbus, Carolina, and Nashville) each twice. Much like the NFL, the preseason schedule is tailored to playing a couple of teams outside your conference and the location of these games cuts down on the travel. The regular season starts on October 8 against Alexander Ovechkin and the rival Washington Capitals.
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