Preds Win! Preds Win!

Pekka Rinne. Remember that name. He's the goalie who just saved our bacon. He stopped the bleeding.

For those not in the loop on the Preds injury woes....our World Champion goalie Tomas Vokoun went down last week with a knee injury. Our normally solid backup, Chris Mason, went down two games later during warm ups, leaving Admirals netminder Brian Finley as really the only guy the Preds had to put between the pipes (we even had Jamie Allison dressed in pads and on the bench as the back up that night...yikes).

Finley has had a stellar season with the Ads, but his first NHL game was a travesty...to say the least. The poor bastard allowed seven goals.

So tonight, another of the Preds' young prospects in goal got his chance to shine...Pekka Rinne (pronounced Pecka Rinnay). And he fared much better than poor Finley did.

Here's Rinne's NHL career stats:

There's nothing there because the dude has never played an NHL game in his life. Tonight...he faced 38 shots and made 35 saves in a 5-3 win for the Preds. Not too shabby. Certainly not ESPN-highlights caliber...but when you consider that this was his first big-dance game ever...well, it's pretty freaking fantastic.

Mostly I am glad to see the Preds get a win. They were on a three-game losing streak (their longest of the season) and desperately needed to secure a victory...and they did. Young Pekka should look proudly into the mirror tonight, having helped us stop a nasty losing streak.

Now, I have no doubt that Finley will get another chance. And he deserves it. Everyone has a bad game. And Finley's been smoking hot in the AHL this year (posting a 6-1 record and a goals against average of less than 2). He's a great goalie. The knock on him is that he's had a ton of injuries...mostly to the groin. He really hasn't had a whole season to show his stuff. I hope the guy gets another chance during Vokoun and Mason's injury time to show his potential, because we're really banking on him being the man once Vokoun retires or moves on.

All these recent goalie woes prove one thing without any doubt: Vokoun is the MVP of our team. Paul Kariya's great...scoring goals is great...Sully is great...our improved defense is great...but Vokoun is the grease that keeps this team's gears moving. Without him...we would surely be lost. Thankfully his injury is just a sprain. He should be back in a week or so. Thank God.

But how weird is it to lose two goalies in non-game injuries (Vokoun was hurt in pre-2nd-period warm-ups, and Mason was hurt in pre-game warm-ups) in a week's span? Strange.

Glad that the team rallied behind young Rinne for the win tonight, scoring five goals to help get the victory. Let's hope we can tread water through this goalie-tribulation...and then pick up steam again once Vokoun is healthy. We do have a REALLY good team. Think about this: we're 19-7 on the season...and we've been without our captain Greg Johnson, our scrapper/playmaker Scott Walker...we were without our tough defenseman Markhov until recently. Legwand's out for at least another three weeks. When they all come back...man...think about how awesome we might be.

Go Preds!!