The Pittsburgh Penguins lost two players and scored zero goals through the first two periods of their 1-0 victory over the Ottawa Senators in Game 2 of the Eastern Conference final. Taking the game into overtime tied at 1, they eventually dropped the ball and allowed the surprising Ottawa Senators to take a 1-0 series lead. "A defenseman or forward catches an edge, he falls down, nothing happens". The rest of the consistently surprising Senators, too.
The win saw Marc-Andre Fleury become the 12th goalie in National Hockey League history to record 10 career postseason shutouts with his 23-save showing. This is the fifth playoff series between the teams. "You just want to redeem yourself".
Those sound like flattering comparisons, but these Penguins aren't those powerhouses, and they aren't close. "That's all I'm trying to do".
The Senators improved to 6-1 in overtime during the playoffs.
It hardly seemed to slow down the Penguins, who spent a large portion of the night playing keepaway from Ottawa in the offensive end.
With perhaps a nod to the Game 1 outcome, Ottawa took a day away from the ice Sunday while the Penguins held a full-team practice.
"It tells me he's invested", said Sullivan. "That's probably as hard a game as we're going to get". If anything, he's embraced it. A year ago they didn't even make the playoffs. Now Ottawa finds itself on equal footing and hardly appeared intimidated by the stage. No, it wasn't pretty - the Ryan goal was the rare breakaway - but the Senators stopped caring about style points long ago. "Ottawa" replied successful outing - Ryan intercepted the puck at the gate and gave a ideal pass to Pajot, who remained a few meters away to slam the disc into the net.
The Ottawa Senators will have to settle for the split.
Far Cry 5 Announced, South Park: The Fractured But Whole On Schedule
Either way, we'll have to wait until either E3 or when Ubisoft puts more information out to learn where we're going in Far Cry 5. We'll keep you posted on more details about the game, which, presumably, will launch on PS4, Xbox One, and PC.
There are a lot of cameras filming the Penguins' bench during games - "too many", as head coach Mike Sullivan joked afterward. The Penguins are 16th among 16 playoff teams, controlling 42 per cent of all shot attempts at five-on-five. "We got 35 shots and we outshot them even though they got a lot of power plays".
Similar to No. 1, this adjustment shouldn't be a problem for Pittsburgh, which owns one of the best "front of the net pests" in wing Patric Hornqvist. Lucky for the Penguins, the Sens powerplay extended its dry run to 7 games (0/17). The series victor will play either Nashville or Anaheim in the Stanley Cup Finals.
Rather than pound away like the Blue Jackets and Capitals tried to do against the Penguins, Ottawa would rather get in Pittsburgh's head.
Malkin had the first chance of the game when the big Russian got in alone on Ottawa goaltender Craig Anderson in the opening moments. If they dump it into the corner of Phaneuf and Methot, they can take advantage of their lack of foot-speed and create a cycle with possession.
The Senators are well aware they're not supposed to be here.
"When you're an offensive player and you're doing all the right things but you're not finishing and that's what it was with Bobby.", Senators coach Guy Boucher said. The Senators finished with just six shots in the third period. "We had the approach we had all year". "So it's been healthy for us".
NOTES: Malkin moved past Jaromir Jagr and into third-place on Pittsburgh's career playoff scoring list with 148 points. Alex Burrows was quick to pounce on the puck and shove it past Fleury, with replays showing the puck eventually found its way into the goal. The call was upheld upon review. Pageau's eight goals are the second-most by a Senators player during a single postseason.
Comments