Stastny scores twice, Jets hold off Predators for second straight win

WINNIPEG-- Paul Stastny scored two goals and the Winnipeg Jets won 6-4 against the Nashville Predators at Canada Life Centre on Saturday.

"More than anything, it's been timely goals," Stastny said. "Whether it's a big power-play goal or whether … today it was [Adam Lowry's] goal after we started slow. Every time they got a goal or came close, we came right back and pounced on them and didn't sit back. That's the biggest."
Nate Schmidt had three assists and Kyle Connor and Pierre-Luc Dubois each had a goal and an assist for the Jets (2-2-1), who won their second straight. Connor Hellebuyck made 26 saves.
Nick Cousins scored and had two assists and Juuse Saros made 23 saves for the Predators (1-4-0) in their first road game of the season.
"Not good enough," Cousins said. "I think defensively, we're just doing it to ourselves. I think through the neutral zone we had the puck on our stick and we're trying to go east-west more so than north-south. They're a good team. They give you nothing in the neutral zone."
Colton Sissons made it 1-0 Predators at 1:15 of the first period.
Less than two minutes later Lowry scored to make it 1-1 at 2:42.

Dubois tipped a Schmidt point shot to make it 2-1 Winnipeg at 1:11 of the second period. Dubois has scored in four straight games.
"The sky's the limit for Pierre," Schmidt said. "You play against the guy and you see how big of a player he is, how impactful he can be. I think when you see him as a player you see what kind of game he can bring. There's so many intangibles with what he can do. He can play big, he can play skilled, he's got a lot of speed. And people forget, I forget, how young he is. He's still a 22, 23 year old guy in the League that's been around for five six years."
Stastny extended it to 3-1 on the power play at 2:34.
Cousins cut the Jets lead to 3-2, scoring on a rebound on the power play at 13:27 of the second.
"I don't think it's a work ethic thing or anything tactical system-wise," Cousins said. "It's just I feel like it's on ourselves. I think the more we play simple that's kind of the recipe for success four our team. It's not overly complicated."
Kristian Vesalainen scored his first NHL goal in his 22nd game at 19:49 of the second to make it 4-2 Jets.
"It took a lot of weight from my shoulders. That was a long time coming so it was really nice," Vesalainen said. "I was actually so glad that I scored so I don't know who picked [up] the puck. I didn't see that at all, but yeah, it's somewhere here for sure."

Predators coach John Hynes said, "I think there's just some things structurally when we're in those areas we can't have the type of breakdowns that we've had, particularly with the type of goaltending that we get. We can't give them gifts like that."
Roman Josi cut Winnipeg's lead to 4-3 with a point shot at 3:10 of the third period.
Stastny scored his second of the game 26 seconds later to make it 5-3 Jets.
Connor made it 6-3 with a power play goal at 6:14 of the third.
"I've liked our last three games an awful lot," Jets coach Paul Maurice said. "I think the important things that we've done well in our last three is we're shooting the puck better with a mindset of being a team that shoots the puck and because of that, you're going to be net front more often. We got some high tips and some low tips net front and we've got players here that can score goals. I think if we play like shooters, we can score goals."
Philip Tomasino scored on the power play at 13:41 of the third for the 6-4 final. The goal came nine seconds after Cousins had a goal overturned on video review when the Jets challenged for offside.
Nashville went 2-for-4 on the power play.
"I thought the power play was clicking tonight. Obviously it's nice to get two goals on the power play," Cousins said. "Usually you take the positives, and there's obviously going to be some teaching stuff that we need to learn from. I think as a hockey player, when you have a game like that where things didn't go our way tonight and you have a chance to kind of bounce back tomorrow against Minnesota. It's a tough building to play in. I mean, there's no better way to flush this one than get right back at it tomorrow."
Hynes said, "I like the fact that we were able to score four. If you score four you should be able to win the game, but we had some breakdowns that went in the back of the net. We had three tip-goals where a couple guys are standing alone right in front of the net front which shouldn't happen."
NOTES: Tommy Novak had three assists in his third NHL game for Nashville. … Connor has eight points (five goals, three assists) on a three-game point streak. … Schmidt has six assists in his past three games.