The Calgary Flames continued their excellent away form with a 5-0 victory over the Nashville Predators on Monday. Miikka Kiprusoff made 22 saves for the Northwest Division leaders as they improved to 10-1-3 on the road. "You have to trust your team mates that they are going to do their jobs," said the Calgary defenceman Adam Pardy.
"With Miikka behind us we are pretty confident standing up, forcing teams to dump pucks, staying up on the rush and not allowing the other team too much time to make plays." The Flames' captain Jarome Iginla notched his 17th goal of the season while David Moss, Nigel Dawes, Pardy and Curtis Glencross also scored in Calgary's fourth straight win. The Predators had gone into the game looking for their ninth win in 10 home games.
"Calgary didn't allow us to get our energy going, plain and simple," Nashville coach Barry Trotz said. Elsewhere, the Washington Capitals' Alex Ovechkin was injured and left the ice during a 3-2 win over the Carolina Hurricanes after colliding with the Hurricanes defenceman Tim Gleason. The injury occurred midway through the first period when the two-time league MVP hit knee-on-knee with Gleason, sending him down for several minutes.
"Any time Alex is hurt, I'm concerned," said the Capitals coach Bruce Boudreau. "I don't know how long he's going to be out." Another player on the sidelines is the Florida Panthers' goalie Thomas Vokoun, who was hit on the head by one of his own team in a 4-2 loss to the Atlanta Thrashers. Vokoun was injured in the first period as Ilya Kovalchuk gave the Thrashers a 2-1 lead and the frustrated Panthers defenceman Keith Ballard tried to smash his stick on the goal post, but instead hit Vokoun. The netminder was laid out for about 10 minutes before being replaced by Scott Clemmensen.
Mike Rupp's hat-trick led the Pittsburgh Penguins to a 5-2 win over the New York Rangers, with Sidney Crosby adding the other two, while the Buffalo Sabres beat the lowly Toronto Maple Leafs 3-0 in a clash of the top and bottom Northeast division teams. * With agencies