• Preview
• Recap
• Bleachers

Hartnell, Erat help Predators snap three-game slide

Dec 8, 2006 - 6:13 AM LOS ANGELES (Ticker) -- Scott Hartnell held his ground and made a milestone game a little more memorable.

Hartnell scored his 11th goal of the season in his 400th career game and Martin Erat collected three assists as the Nashville Predators posted a 4-1 victory over the Los Angeles Kings.

In ending a three-game losing streak, Nashville scored three times on special teams in a 7 1/2-minute stretch of the second period. The Predators raised their record to 18-4-3 in their last 25 games.

"I though the guys played really well," Nashville coach Barry Trotz said. "They didn't give up a lot of chances and played (with a) real short bench. We are missing a bunch of key people right now. Guys dug in and we got contributions from all areas of our lineup again."

The Predators opened the scoring at 6:46 of the second session after Kings left wing Alexander Frolov was called for hooking. Erat sent a centering pass in front to Hartnell, who slipped the puck between goaltender Dan Cloutier's pads while being knocked down from behind by defenseman Aaron Miller.

"We were working up top and got it down to Erat," Hartnell said. "The defenseman was playing on my back and I could feel him kind of whacking on my back, and I just held my stick right there as hard as I could and Marty made a great pass. I think (Cloutier) thought I might be going far side, and I went between his legs."

Coming off a career-high 25 goals last season, the 24-year-old Hartnell leads the team in tallies and is 10 points shy of 200 for his career.

"Four hundred (games) is a big number and I'm just happy I've been healthy enough," Hartnell said. "I am hoping there is a lot more to come. It (has) been an awesome ride."

Jerred Smithson doubled the advantage for the Predators with a shorthanded tally roughly four minutes later, firing a wrist shot that got by Cloutier's right pad for his second goal of the season and first since October 18.

Captain Kimmo Timonen netted his sixth of the campaign with a bad-angle shot from near left corner that glanced off Cloutier's left shoulder for a 3-0 lead with 5:43 remaining in the middle session.

Rookie Alexander Radulov scored with the man advantage in the third and Chris Mason made 20 saves in his seventh straight start in place of the injured Tomas Vokoun.

Mason made one of his finest stops of the game midway through the second period, snagging rookie Anze Kopitar's shot from the doorstep with his glove while at the right goalpost.

"(Mason) has played really well," Trotz said. "He (is) a real battler. We're really fortunate to have Tomas and him as a 1-2 combination. If you don't have goaltending, it's really hard to win hockey games in this league."

Frolov netted his 17th goal and Cloutier stopped 23 shots for Los Angeles, which had its four-game home winning streak against Nashville ended.

"I really feel awful about that effort," Kings coach Marc Crawford said. "When you have an effort like that, you really have to search your souls, and we are going to have to do some serious searching for the entire team."