If it was a spark he wanted with the goalie change, Pittsburgh Penguins coach Mike Sullivan got it in Game 4 of the Eastern Conference finals. The 22-year-old justified Sullivan's decision to turn back to him in the crease over Marc-Andre Fleury, who had performed brilliantly before a shaky four-goal outing in Game 3 on Wednesday night. So as I said, these decisions are very hard.
"I think we were sitting back a little too much", winger Tom Pyatt said. "So, if Mark's the guy we go to, we know he can continue to help us win games". And that's why we very well may have seen Fleury in a Pittsburgh uniform for the very last time.
Western Conference finals: Predators at Ducks - Nashville centre Ryan Johansen will miss the rest of the Stanley Cup playoffs after undergoing surgery on a left thigh injury, leaving the Preds without their leading scorer when they visit the Anaheim Ducks needing two wins to make their first trip to the Stanley Cup Final. Fleury was pulled when he allowed his fourth goal on nine shots and that came after Smith scored on a wraparound.
Last season, the Penguins rode rookie goalie Matt Murray to a Stanley Cup.
"Marc was a professional like he always is", Sullivan said. "I don't think we showed up in the first, and then after that we played better".
Craig Custance of ESPN.com passed along comments from Sullivan, who discussed the difficulty of possessing two potential No. 1 netminders ahead of Friday's game at the Canadian Tire Centre.
That's because Fleury is both well-liked in the locker room and had been playing outstanding hockey before his meltdown in Game 3.
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They split time during the regular season, but Murray held a clear edge in both GAA (2.41 to 3.02) and save percentage (.923 to.909). Sidney Crosby, who led the National Hockey League with 44 goals, has one in the series.
The Penguins finally found some offensive success against the Senators in game four, and now they head home to where they are 5-3 during these playoffs. While his initial shot was stopped, the rebound bounced off Penguins defenseman Ian Cole and into the net.
For the first time in the series, if not the playoffs, the Penguins' defensemen headed to the team bus certain they made a marked difference on the scoresheet.
"I've really been enjoying this playoff run", Fleury said Thursday. Boucher had said it gets tougher and tougher to score on the power play in the playoffs because of the way players defend and sacrifice. The Ottawa Senators have lost 14 of their last 18 games when allowing three or more goals. They're now without their top two offensive defencemen in Kris Letang and Justin Schultz, and they're playing a team that makes it especially hard on opponents who don't have someone well suited to slogging the puck through Ottawa's neutral zone quicksand. Setting up the play was Crosby, who had an urgency to his game which had been lacking early this series (one goal, no assists). So I put that one behind already, and Ill be ready to go..
Instead of flying home on the brink of elimination, the Penguins appear to have their Stanley Cup-winning mojo back heading into Sunday's Game 5. Compare that to the first meeting between the teams this year when Pittsburgh won 8-5 shootout in November. I think seeing the way we played, hopefully thats something we can build off of..
"I don't really care at this point as long as it goes in the net", Thompson said.
Murray may have come in and played well Wednesday night, but Fleury has been excellent for more than four weeks at this point.
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