Red Wings' Hasek Credits Defense for Win

Saturday, November 11th 2006, 7:46 am

By: News On 6

If Dominik Hasek is looking like his old, dominating self, credit his defense. Hasek stopped 21 shots while getting his second consecutive shutout as the Detroit Red Wings beat the Nashville Predators 3-0 Friday night.

He ranged out of the net to play the puck even when it wasn't the most prudent thing to do.

``What can I say?'' the 41-year-old goalie said after Detroit's eighth straight victory. ``I really appreciated the way my teammates played in front of me.''

Hasek, who has 71 career shutouts, has not allowed a goal in 153 minutes and 28 seconds. He helped Detroit beat Edmonton 3-0 Wednesday night.

Hasek and the Red Wings haven't allowed a goal since 6:32 of the second period in a 4-1 win over Columbus on Saturday night.

In other NHL games, it was: Edmonton 4, Columbus 1; Ottawa 6, Pittsburgh 3; the New York Rangers 5, Atlanta 2; Buffalo 5, Florida 4 in overtime; Chicago 3, St. Louis 1; and Calgary 3, Anaheim 0.

Hasek downplayed the Red Wings' recent run.

``I feel very good the way I play,'' he said. ``It's a long season and one or two weeks of great play doesn't mean much to me.''

While Hasek seems to be hitting his stride after a slow start, the Red Wings are making his job easier by playing good defense in front of the net. He only had to stop 16 shots against Edmonton.

Nicklas Lidstrom, who had one of Detroit's goals against Nashville, attributed the Red Wings' success to their position on the ice.

``I think that's as good defensively as we've ever played,'' he said. ``Not a big gap between the forwards and the defensemen.''

Robert Lang, and Dan Cleary also scored for Detroit (11-4-1), which had 40 shots.

The shutout snapped a five-game winning streak for Nashville (9-4-1), and its run of 10 straight games (9-0-1) with at least a point. Tomas Vokoun made 37 saves.

``I thought they beat us in all the hard areas today,'' Nashville coach Barry Trotz said. ``There's no question they were the better team. They executed better. We didn't execute coming out of the zone and turned the puck over too much. They won all the one-on-one battles. They just kept putting the puck on the net.''

Flames 3, Ducks 0

At Calgary, Alberta, Miikka Kiprusoff stopped 37 shots to earn the shutout and the Flames became the first team to beat Anaheim in regulation this season.

Daymond Langkow and Tony Amonte scored first-period goals for the Flames, who have won three straight. Matthew Lombardi added an empty-netter late in the third.

The Ducks were unbeaten in regulation the first 16 games (12-0-4), setting an NHL record and breaking the previous mark set by the 1984-85 Edmonton Oilers (12-0-3).

Senators 6, Penguins 3

At Pittsburgh, Dany Heatley scored Ottawa's first and last goals and Jason Spezza added a goal and two assists, helping the Senators end the franchise's longest losing streak in 10 years.

The Senators scored three consecutive goals after Penguins' rookie Evgeni Malkin scored his eighth goal in 10 games to tie it 2-2 about 6 minutes into the second period.

Andrej Meszaros, Wade Redden and Peter Schaefer scored the next three goals as Ottawa opened a 5-2 lead early in the third. Michel Ouellet and Maxime Talbot also scored for Pittsburgh.

Sabres 5, Panthers 4, OT

Thomas Vanek had two goals, including the winner 19 seconds into overtime, and host Buffalo erased another two-goal deficit to win its second straight and 13th overall.

Brian Campbell, Paul Gaustad and Ales Kotalik also scored for the Sabres, who have come back to win six times after falling behind by two goals this season.

Gary Roberts, Ruslan Salei, Joe Nieuwendyk, and Steve Montador scored for the Panthers, who lost their second straight.

Oilers 4, Blue Jackets 1

Ryan Smyth scored twice and visiting Edmonton snapped a four-game losing streak.

Ales Hemsky and Joffrey Lupul added goals for the Oilers, who opened the scoring with two goals 1:38 apart early in the second period. Dwayne Roloson finished with 26 saves.

Anson Carter scored his second goal in 14 games for Columbus, which had won two of three.

Rangers 5, Thrashers 2

Michael Nylander scored two goals, including one 15 seconds into the game, and added an assist to lead visiting New York, which had goals on two of its first three shots.

Jaromir Jagr had three assists and Matt Cullen added two as the Rangers won for the fourth time in five games and ended Atlanta's four-game winning streak. Michal Rozsival, Brendan Shanahan and Petr Prucha also scored for the Rangers.

Vyacheslav Kozlov and Ilya Kovalchuk scored power-play goals for Atlanta.

Blackhawks 3, Blues 1

At Chicago, Radim Vrbata scored two power-play goals in the first period and the Blackhawks ended an eight-game losing streak.

Sebastien Caron stopped 24 shots in his debut in goal for Chicago. Bryan Smolinksi scored a power-play goal into an empty net with 13 seconds left in the third period.

Lee Stempniak scored for the Blues, who dropped their third straight and are 1-5-1 in their last seven.