They came, they saw, they fell behind, and they won by three.
The Philadelphia Flyers kept up with the Pittsburgh Penguins blow for blow, then delivered the knockout punch midway through the third period.
Claude Giroux and Sean Couturier each recorded a hat trick and Jaromir Jagr scored the game winning goal to put the Flyers up 2-0 in the series.
The Penguins preached that the hitting and neutral zone dump ins needed to continue after blowing a 3-0 lead on Wednesday in game 1. But the Flyers found a way to strike back, tying the score at 3-3, 4-4, and 5-5 before taking their first lead in the series 9:13 into the third, and hanging on for an 8-5 victory.
Sidney Crosby wasted no time getting the Penguins on the board to start the game. Just 15 seconds in, Crosby took a return pass on a give and go from Steve Sullivan and rifled the puck past Ilya Bryzgalov.
Midway through the first period, Chris Kunitz gave the Penguins their first power play goal of the series, stuffing in a puck in front of the crease and extending the lead to 2-0.
The Penguins got another power play when Nicklas Grossman was called for holding 10:55 into the first. But ex-Penguin, Maxime Talbot, scored short handed, slamming in a rebound from Claude Giroux on a partial breakaway.
With time winding down in the opening period, Paul Martin scored his third playoff goal. Sidney Crosby gained the offensive zone on the rush and dropped the puck back to Martin who fired the puck between the face-off circles. It appeared to be a perfectly placed shot as the puck went past the stick side of Bryzgalov.
The Penguins, once again, appeared to have control of the game. However, a power play goal and short handed goal from Claude Giroux tied the game at 3-3.
Pittsburgh responded to Giroux’s shorthanded goal just six seconds later. Evgeni Malkin won the face-off forward and charged into the Flyers’ zone. His spinning backhanded pass to Neal produced a one-time shot that went off the pads of Bryzgalov and right on the stick of Chris Kunitz who buried the puck into a wide open net.
With the Penguins retaking the lead heading in the final minute of the second period, the Flyers got a jolt from rookie Sean Couturier. After one of countless Penguins’ neutral zone turnovers, the Flyers entered the zone. Nicklas Grossman passed the puck over to Brayden Coburn who fired a shot on net. Marc-Andre Fleury produced a juicy rebound for Couturier who jumped at the opportunity and scored on the wide open net.
In the third period, Tyler Kennedy scored on a backhand shot just 1:04 into the period. Once again, the Flyers sucked the life out of the sold out crowd at Consol Energy Center, as they had for nearly every game since last year when the building first opened.
The Penguins won a neutral zone face-off but Ben Lovejoy turned the puck over to Couturier who flew in on Fleury and scored on a backhanded shot in front.
From there, the Flyers took over. Jaromir Jagr scored in front off of a defensive zone turnover by the Penguins, Couturier added his third goal, capping off a 2 on 1 just seconds after James Neal missed a game tying opportunity at the other end, and Claude Giroux added the empty netter to seal the game.
With the series heading back to Philadelphia, the Flyers appear to have the Penguins right where they want them. But the Flyers, recording the most wins on the road this season, have the 16th most wins at home.
- Pascal Dupuis now has a point in 19 straight games.
- Both teams combined for 74 hits in Game 2.
- Claude Giroux tallied 6 points in the game, moving him to the top of the league leaders in the playoffs.
- The Flyers are 2 for 3 on the power play this series.
Three Stars
- Sean Couturier
- Claude Giroux
- Chris Kunitz
Photo courtesy of Yahoo! sports
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