Yes, I know, I’ve covered the Penguins a lot lately – if you’re looking for baseball, I promise we’ll cover that in the next two weeks. I originally was planning to review the baseball season at the quarter-pole, but after attending Game 2 of the Hurricanes-Penguins series last Thursday night, I changed my mind. I am going to try a different format this week – since a picture is worth a thousand words, there will be less words and many photos of the game.
There was a real sense of excitement before the game – the weather, the band and the big screen made for a party-type atmosphere. The fact that Carolina plays a similar up-tempo style, and isn’t NEARLY as reviled as Philly or Washington, also played into the excitement. In the previous two series, when I attended I sensed fans wanted a ‘pound of flesh’ type game – they were as interested in physical play against the Flyers and Caps as they were in scoring goals. The ‘Canes do not whip the mob into that kind of frenzy, the fans simply want to see great hockey.
There was action from the very beginning. Only 1:51 into the game, Chris Kunitz set up behind the net and fed Crosby a great pass in front for a goal. 1:15 later Carolina answered with a goal from Chad LaRose on a scramble in front of the goal mouth. Five minutes later Evgeni Malkin struck, coming straight off the bench to bang in a rebound and put the Pens up 2-1. Carolina AGAIN answered quickly, as postseason sensation Jussi Jokinen tallied for the ‘Canes. When Kris Letang’s poor clearing attempt led to a goal for Carolina’s Dennis Seidenberg at 12:40 of the period, it seemed like a crossroad in the game: would Pittsburgh fold, or keep pressing the Hurricanes? The rest of the period settled down, but everyone around me seemed sure that there was more scoring to come. Fleury wasn’t great but he did make 1 or 2 big saves in the period…surprisingly, Ward hadn’t made any big saves to that point for Carolina.
SECOND PERIOD
I put the camera away for this period, to enjoy the game with my kids, but there were some TERRIFIC plays in this frame. Malkin made a GREAT pass from the neutral zone to spring Maxime Talbot in alone against goalie Ward, and Talbot buried a slap shot to tie the game. Good goal, but frankly a stoppable shot. 12 minutes into the period Malkin completed the ‘Gordie Howe hat trick’ (goal, assist, fight) by fighting LaRose – the referees only assigned roughing penalties, but both guys had thrown off the gloves. Malkin had played well to this point, but after this penalty he played at a level unlike anything I’ve seen from him. Perhaps Carolina will learn to let sleeping dogs lie – both Malkin and Crosby have a history of playing better when they are mad.
Chris Kunitz gave Pittsburgh another lead with 7 seconds left in the period off of a Bill Guerin pass. The goal was huge for the team and huge for Kunitz – after a terrific regular season with the Pens, Kunitz hadn’t scored a goal in the playoffs. Despite the lead, again you could sense there were more goals to come…
THIRD PERIOD
Carolina is a resilient, no-quit team – they tied the game in only 2:35 on a goal by 4th-liner Patrick Eaves. Defenseman Phillippe Boucher made a terrible play behind the net which led to the goal. However, the Penguins seemed to control play for long stretches after the tying goal, and at 8:50 Malkin banged home a rebound to give the Penguins their third lead of the evening. But his best was still to come: a bit over 3 minutes later Malkin pushed an offensive-zone faceoff behind the goal, beat the defense to the puck, carried it out to the left of the goal, and fired a backhand shot over the glove of Ward for the hat trick. A simply AMAZING, unassisted goal by a great player!
The Pens added an empty-netter late, then things got a bit chippy. I confess that we missed this part, with the kids having school Friday we left with 2:00 to go.
Final thoughts:
-I’ve been to many games over the years, and this one ranked at or near the top in terms of excitement. Lots of up-and-down action, great individual plays, all in a playoff atmosphere – hard to ask for any more than that.
-Having said that, both teams were a little loose on defense – and Cam Ward was downright BAD. While Fleury made several great saves (including one with about 5 minutes to go to keep the score 6-4), I didn’t see Ward make any above-average saves, and he let in at least two questionable goals. If Ward isn’t the Canes’ best player in this series, Carolina will lose – it’s that simple.
-Whatever happens from here, I hope I’ve heard the last of the playoff criticism directed towards Crosby and Malkin. Both have had stellar postseason campaigns – Malkin has 25 points, Crosby 24 in only 15 games – and both have come up HUGE when their team needed them most.
-This seems obvious perhaps, but Carolina is in deep trouble. I know they’ve been the Comeback Kids for 6 weeks, but they played two pretty good games against Pittsburgh and lost them both. Ward has to steal at least two games by himself for the ‘Canes to have a chance. I respect him enough to think it’s possible, but very unlikely. Looking more and more like a Pens-Red Wings rematch!
Dave Glass lives in Clearfield with his wife, Suzanne, and their six children. He can be reached at buggyracer@verizon.net.