The Boston Bruins headed into the Consol Energy Center to play a 12:30 game after losing to the Washington Capitals the night before. Their matchup against Pittsburgh would be the second game in the last 24 hours.
The Penguins took advantage.
Pittsburgh got out to a 3-0 lead, chasing Tim Thomas after the first period of play, and never looked back. Despite two goals from David Krejci to make the game close, the Penguins never relinquished the lead and never stopped pounding the Boston defensemen.
Pittsburgh got on the board early with a goal by Arron Asham 3:54 into the game. Craig Adams took the puck from the corner of the boards, passed to Ben Lovejoy whose slapshot was partially stopped by Shawn Thornton’s stick. However, the puck trickled slowly past the Bruins’ forward which game Asham the opportunity to fire the puck past Tim Thomas.
Nearly four minutes later, James Neal went for a puck that was dumped into the corner. Zdeno Chara, at 6’9, stood in Neal’s way, attempting to stop him from getting to the puck. Neal push Chara out of the way, moved the puck over to Evgeni Malkin who passed it back to Matt Niskanen. Niskanen’s slapshot beat Thomas who was screened by Neal and Chara in front.
From there, the Bruins lost composure.
Milan Lucic was penalized for slashing and Zdeno Chara was sent to the box for tripping less than a minute later. The Penguins capitalized on the 5 on 3 advantage, something they failed to do in their first matchup with Boston earlier this season.
Evgeni Malkin took the puck at center ice, skated down the near side boards and found James Neal cutting across the other side of the ice. Malkin’s tape to tape pass gave Neal an excellent look at the net and, for the first time since signing his $30 million contract last month, Neal did not miss. His shot beat Thomas low, stick side bringing the sold out crowd of 18,609 to their feet.
With Marty Turco replacing Tim Thomas to start the second period, David Krejci scored to pull the game within two. Krejci took a pass at the blue line, skated past Ben Lovejoy and beat Marc-Andre Fleury over the left shoulder. The goal gave Boston hope, but the task of coming back with three players leaving due to injury, a backup goaltender who hasn’t started in a year, and a team that was tired from playing the night before was too tall.
The Penguins quickly countered, getting a goal from one of the most dominant lines in the NHL. Chris Kunitz scored his 20th goal of the season on one of the prettier passing plays of the year. Evgeni Malkin went behind the Boston net, shoveled the puck to James Neal with one hand on his stick as he was falling down. As the Bruins quickly rushed to deny Neal, he fed a cross-ice pass to Kunitz for a one timer that blistered the back of the net.
Krejci scored again, taking a puck in front of the net and roofing it over Fleury after a nice backhand pass from Milan Lucic but it was as close as Boston would get.
Marc-Andre Fleury shutdown the B’s in the third period including a glove save on Dennis Seidenberg and a dazzling save on Krejci. With Boston on the power play, Joe Corvo’s slapshot deflected off of a few players before Krejci found it and tried to get around a sprawling Fleury. The shot had enough elevation but Fleury snatched the puck out of mid-air to preservce a two goal lead.
The Penguins got a late tally from Pascal Dupuis for his 5th point in the last 3 games, and when the final horn sounded, the team had clinched their ninth straight victory and pulled within two points of the Eastern Conference leading, New York Rangers. While the Rangers play the Islanders tonight, the Penguins are off until playing the Rangers on Thursday. And the NHL’s hottest team will be going for ten straight with a high probability that the best player in the league returns.
- Malkin’s three assists put him back on top of the NHL scoring race with 82 points, two ahead of Steven Stamkos.
- Malkin’s first assist of the game was also his 500th point. He is the 17th Russian-born player to reach 500 points in NHL history.
- The Penguins’ 9 game winning streak is the second longest in the NHL this season. The Boston Bruins had a 10 game winning streak earlier this season.
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