Predators won’t know where they sit until after their road trip
102.5 The Game: Nashville Predators GM David Poile when asked if he needs to see a little more from the team or if he thinks the team has turned the corner.
** NHLRumors.com transcription
“I think it’s a combination of things as it always is. There is no question that our play has improved. Things that we were really negative on at the beginning of the year, specifically our power play and penalty killing have much improved in the last few games. A lot of our breakdowns had allowed to goals against which is certainly partly due to our improved goaltending. There is a lot of things to be positive about. The lines have been somewhat the same the last three or four games.
You see a young player like Tolvanen now that has three goals and has really helped us on the power play. And now we go into, we played Columbus, we played Detroit, now we have a whole series of games with Carolina, Florida, back to Carolina, Tampa Bay, Florida, the top three teams in our division with a sprinkled in game with Dallas. It’s another one of those makeup games.
So I would say after we have this homestand and we go away for 16 days long road trip, I would pretty well think we’d have a good barometer of what we felt about our team at that point.”
Poile when asked about how he responds to National pundits bringing up the Predators, selling off assets, and a rebuild.
“I try not to respond. Especially to the media.
I get it. There’s nothing to hide here. We’ve talked about this. Our team has had a great run highlighted by the Stanley Cup finals but that was three years ago and we’ve been a good team the last two years but not as good as we were at our peak. So there’s a little bit of decline. Obviously the start of the season we were a perfect fodder for any conversation as to trades and rebuild and that’s going to continue until we either climb higher in the standings or we actually make a trade.
So I get it. Trade deadline is April 12th. I just said earlier that this next stretch of games that we’re playing against Carolina, Florida and Tampa Bay are really going to show us whether we’re one of the top teams in our division. Whether we’re a playoff team or possibly that we’re not.
I would think maybe what you asked me, what we’re talking about now, maybe a more appropriate question when we get back off this road trip.”
