Disallowed goal costly in latest Thrashers loss

By Chris Vivlamore

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

The Thrashers are having trouble scoring goals -- even when the puck ends up in the back of the net.

After having an apparent game-tying goal disallowed, the Thrashers dropped a 2-1 decision to Nashville on Tuesday night. It was the third consecutive loss for the Thrashers -- now 28-27-10, 66 points -- and another damaging blow in the team’s playoff race. Atlanta remains in 10th place in the Eastern Conference, behind the ninth-place New York Rangers by a point and the eighth-place tie between Boston and Montreal by four points.

Trailing by a goal with 6:45 left in the second period, Evgeny Artyukhin slid a puck in front of the net, and Chris Thorburn appeared to knock it past Predators goaltender Dan Ellis. However the official ruled that Thorburn, who was standing in the crease, did not allow Ellis to play the puck and nullified the goal.

“I don’t know if I hit the goalie or not, but he said it was goalie interference,” Thorburn said. “It’s unfortunate. We are having a tough time trying to score goals. I was just trying to crash the net. I don’t think it was goalie interference, but I haven’t seen the tape.”

Thrashers coach John Anderson said he was unsure just why the goal was waved off.

“How many goals have you seen go in like that against us?” Anderson said. “I’m very, very disappointed. I’m going to have to ask the league about it because I don’t understand what the call was. Was it goaltender interference? Then why didn’t we have a penalty? I don’t get the call, and I’m very disappointed in that. I don’t get the call. I didn’t like it.”

The Predators jumped out early with two first-period goals -- one gift-wrapped.

Ryan Sutter opened the scoring with a power-play goal 4:48 into the game. He ripped a shot from the point, with Martin Erat and Patric Hornqvist in front of the net, which beat a screened goaltender Johan Hedberg.

With 1:22 left in the period, Thrashers defenseman Mark Popovic had the puck all alone and began to skate up the ice. However, the puck slid off his stick in the open ice and was intercepted by Colin Wilson right in front of Hedberg. Wilson quickly snapped a shot into the back of the net.

“It bounced,” Popovic said. “It happens, especially as a D-man, when it happens it’s more obvious. Just bad timing. This time of year those kinds of bounces can be the difference. I thought we played hard. We just couldn’t score on them.

“It happens to everyone. I will happen again in my career, hopefully not this year. … I’m not looking to blame that game on myself. It was a bad bounce and I’ll be ready the next time.”

The game-winning goal was just a bad break, the Thrashers said.

“It takes a bounce sometimes,” said Hedberg, who stopped 30 shots. “That’s going to happen. That’s when I need to be there to bail him out, but he got off a shot that ricochet off my stick and into the net.”

“It happens to everybody at some point,” defenseman Ron Hainsey said. “It will probably happen again. After that, everybody tried to get together to get over that bad-ice kind of play.”

The Thrashers got on the scoreboard just 29 seconds into the second period when Nik Antropov tipped a Johnny Oduya shot past Ellis. It was Antropov’s 17th goal of the season and gives him 13 points (four goals, nine assists) in the past nine games.

The Thrashers have been outscored 12-3 in the past three games. Facing a favorable March schedule, with 12 of 17 games at home, the Thrashers are 2-2 at home and 2-3 in the month.

“You have to remember that when you are a fragile team it means a lot when you get down by two goals,” Anderson said. “You kind of take a step back. We regrouped in the dressing room and we came out [in the second period] and played well after that. I don’t think we had a bad first period. They had two power plays. They had one shot, and it went in the net. When you look at our shots we had on our power play and they don’t go in. It’s a very tight game. Bounce here, bounce there and it went against us tonight.”