What’s next for Blue Jackets?
Team must refocus with 16-game win streak over
Even before the Columbus Blue Jackets’ winning streak ended, coach John Tortorella wondered what would happen next.
How would a team that hadn’t lost in five weeks handle the aftermath?
After giving his players a welcome day off following a clunker of a 5-0 loss to the Washington Capitals that ended the streak at 16, Tortorella will soon find out. The Blue Jackets host the New York Rangers today and the Philadelphia Flyers on Sunday with little margin for error in the stacked Metropolitan Division.
“I think we’ve crossed that bridge is that we know we’re a good hockey club and not one game is going to deter how we feel about ourselves,” Tortorella said Thursday night after the loss.
“It’s an unforgiving league and we’ve preached it: You can’t worry about what just happened. We’ve got to move by this right away.”
For the past five weeks, the Blue Jackets were defined by a winning streak that fell one short of the 1992-93 Pittsburgh Penguins’ NHL record.
Knowing from years of experience that losing reveals more than winning, Tortorella is anxious to see how players respond today against the team he coached for five seasons and in the coming weeks.
“You cannot exhale,” Tortorella said. “We have so much hockey to be played. I still don’t know who we are. … We have a long ways to go here to really define who we are.”
Friday’s games
PANTHERS 2, PREDATORS 1: In Sunrise, Fla., Jonathan Marchessault scored in the third period, James Reimer made 28 saves and Florida beat Nashville.
The Panthers held a moment of silence before the game for the victims of the shooting earlier in the day at the Fort Lauderdale airport. The arena was darkened and the airport code FLL was illuminated on the scoreboard.
MAPLE LEAFS 4, DEVILS 2: In Newark, N.J., Nazem Kadri sparked Toronto’s four-goal first period with a power-play score, leading the Maple Leafs to another victory.
BLACKHAWKS 2, HURRICANES 1: In Chicago, Scott Darling made a seasonhigh 39 saves, Jonathan Toews and Artemi Panarin scored and Chicago held on for its second straight win. AVALANCHE 2, ISLANDERS 1: In Denver, Nathan MacKinnon scored 4:43 into overtime, and Colorado beat New York for its first win at home in more than seven weeks. CANUCKS 4, FLAMES 2: In Vancouver, British Columbia, Markus Granlund had two goals and an assist, Ryan Miller made 44 saves and Vancouver beat Calgary. DUCKS 3, COYOTES 2, OT: In Anaheim, Calif., Ondrej Kase scored at 4:24 of overtime, and Anaheim beat Arizona.