Still, the Penguins stayed the course. "Give them credit. Give Pittsburgh credit".
The same goes for Lundqvist, who couldn't wait for a shot at redemption after the worst regular season of his career. Sure, the backend has taken a hit with the injury to the irreplaceable Kris Letang, but Olli Maatta and Trevor Daley were both back for Game 1 against the Blue Jackets and this is still a Penguins squad that possesses the ability to roll out three different lines that can contain a star scorer, be it Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin or Phil Kessel.
That time arrived Wednesday night against Columbus. He was undoubtedly excellent in the opening rounds of the post-season in 2015-16, but finished with a.912 SP and 2.11 GAA in the final two rounds. It leaves an open shooting lane, and he somehow threads it top shelf while leaning away from the shot. He's been in the league longer than all but two active goalies (Roberto Luongo and Ryan Miller), and obviously has the longest tenure with a single team since making his NHL debut at age 19 in the last pre-lockout season.
He responded to Sullivan's request to shoot more, and it paid dividends.
Syria chemical attack 'fabricated' - Assad
This comes after consensus from US and world leaders that his government forces were behind the attack. In the interview, Assad insisted his regime gave up all its chemical weapons in 2013.
This resulted in Murray having to leave the warm up immediately with a lower-body injury, and if you watch it it's a groin injury which means he could be out this entire first round. That may or may not be the case, but that's a discussion for another time. Defensively, the Columbus Blue Jackets are allowing 2.4 goals per game and are killing 82.5 percent of their opponents power plays.
The Oilers jumped out to a 2-0 first-period lead only for the veteran Sharks to come back and tie the game with just over 15 minutes to play. Montreal outshot NY 16-5 in the first period, but couldn't beat Lundqvist.
Frank Vatrano added a goal for Boston in his National Hockey League playoff game, and Tuukka Rask made 26 saves. They recorded a total of 25 shot attempts that period and 12 were on net.
After the game, head coach Sullivan promised there'd be more information about Murray's injury come Thursday after he was re-evaluated. The Blue Jackets are 0-4 in the last 4 meetings in Pittsburgh, 2-5 in the last 7 meetings and the home team is 5-0 in the last 5 meetings. But, while some might view the stabbing as another reason to brag "hockey players and its fans are so tough", it's pretty stupid the man chose to wait until after the game to get checked out. He said playing 1:45 in the third period Wednesday would not affect him moving forward. The postseason is a long ride, and there's no telling what can happen in the coming weeks but for right now, Fleury is the guy and the Penguins are perfectly fine with that.
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