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Saturday night brought a game that had some major implications when the Columbus Blue Jackets hit the road to face the Phoenix Coyotes. The Blue Jackets needed a win to not fall further out of playoff contention while Phoenix tried to continue their climb back up the standings after a bad start. Phoenix got two third-period goals from Martin Hanzal to pull out a 5-3 win. Columbus now has got major problems if they want to do anything playoff-related this season being 4-9-1. The Coyotes moved to 7-6-2 with the win to get back over the .500 mark.
Columbus has done a horrible job all season scoring and just putting up more goals than their season average has to be a positive along with the fact that Jared Boll scored and had an assist instead of getting into a major brawl. Boll has a reputation now as a tough guy with over 900 penalty minutes in his career so scoring two points when he only had one for the season before Saturday had to be a different experience for sure. The Blue Jackets probably were happy to see some scoring as opposed to fighting majors out of Boll.
It is apparent to me that the Coyotes however have turned a corner with this win and could now launch themselves into the Western Conference race. Mike Smith is playing better in goal even after giving up three goals. It was a night that saw different things happen for both teams and something that both teams can learn from. The two teams are going into two different directions however as this season rolls on.
Andy Schmidt is a columnist/writer for RantSports. Follow him on Twitter @ASchmidtSports, like his Facebook page or add him to your network on Google.
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