Brooks Orpik and Penguins Stun Capitals in OT Thriller
It’s only fitting that at least one game in this series between the top three heavyweights in the NHL goes into overtime. The 17,132 white clad Penguin fans at the Igloo were fired up from the get-go as the Washington Capitals came to town for game three of the Eastern Conference Semi-finals. Less than a minute and half into the game, Alexander Ovechkin silenced them with his eighth goal of the playoffs and with less than two minutes to play in regulation, he helped silence them again by assisting on the game-tying goal. But it in the end, it would be Ovechkin and the Capitals who would leave the ice silenced, as the Pittsburgh Penguins emerged victorious in overtime with a 3-2 win last night at the Mellon Arena.
Not too long after the first puck dropped, Marc Andre-Fleury came out of his crease to play a puck behind the net and in the process his stick fell out of his hand. The puck made its way around the boards back to Ovechkin and he rifled a shot past a diving, helpless Fleury to give the Capitals a 1-0 lead at 1:23. After being outplayed for the first half of the period, the Penguins responded by playing aggressive and battling for each possession. They would end up with eight shots in the period, after having only one shot on goal through the first ten minutes.
The Penguins retaliated in the second period when Ruslan Fedotenko attempted a short wrist shot that was stopped in front of net by Capital defenseman Mike Green. The puck bounced back to Fedotenko and he blasted a shot past Varlamov’s shoulder to knot the game at 1 halfway through the period.
With a little over five minutes left to play in the third, Evgeni Malkin, who has yet to score in this series, drew a hooking penalty from Alexander Semin. Malkin brought the sold out crowd to it’s feet when he bobbed and weaved around Capital center Brooks Laich and fired a bullet from the slot above Varlamov’s right shoulder to give the Penguins a 2-1 lead at 15:01. "Malkin was at another level," Penguins coach Dan Bylsma said. "He was dominant with the puck and he had the goal, which was fantastic." Ovechkin apparently begged to differ, "No, he play the same. Same level."
The euphoria would not last long, however, as Pascal Dupuis was penalized for interfering with Tom Poti at 17:32. With traffic around Fleury’s net, Niklas Backstrom and Ovechkin took turns stabbing at the puck, trying to get it across the goal line. Backstrom won the battle as he managed to get the puck to deflect into the net off of Fleury’s skate to knot the game at two apiece. The goal, at 18:10, was Backstrom’s first of the playoffs.
Throughout the entire game, both goalies made impressive saves to keep their teams in the game. Once again, Simeon Varlamov was extraordinary in goal, making 39 saves, almost all of them exciting. At one point in the third period, he stopped Kris Letang on two consecutive rapid-fire blasts from the left circle. Letang finally beat him with his sixth shot on goal at 11:23 of the overtime period, giving the Penguins a 3-2 victory and cutting Washington’s lead in the series to 2-1. Sidney Crosby won the face off in the right circle and dished the puck backwards to Mark Eaton. Eaton passed it over to Letang who rifled a one-timer through traffic, which deflected off Capitals defenseman Shaone Morrison and over Varlamov into the net. It was Letang’s first ever career playoff goal, despite almost not playing due to a shoulder injury he sustained in game two.
"We knew we had Tanger set up for a one-timer if we won it clean," Crosby said. "I just got it back to [Mark] Eaton and we got a good bounce there. We've been working on those plays, so it's nice to see when it works."
The Penguins out shot the Capitals 42-23 and led the game in power plays at 7-2. The Capitals took six consecutive minor penalties at one point. Despite Varlamov nearly stealing the game, Washington coach Bruce Boudreau and Ovechkin took issue with the officiating throughout the game. "When you get a goaltending effort like that, you have to win because they don't come around every day," Boudreau said. "I think we might have deserved the penalties, but they sure as hell deserved a few more than they got."
"I don't want to talk about Varlamov. I don't want to talk about the referees too,” said Ovechkin. “They only had two penalties, it's kind of a joke."
Game four is Friday night in Pittsburgh.
Odds & Ends…Of the nine games Simeon Varlamov has played in this post-season, he has been named one of the top three stars in seven of them…Even though his team lost tonight, Varlamov has been the difference in this series so far. While Crosby and Ovechkin are offensive juggernauts, they cancel each other out, and what you’re left with are the two goaltenders, and Washington has the edge here. Varly made 39 saves and on almost every one I found myself yelling “Oh” along with the crowd. He keeps Washington in the game no matter what and had that goal in OT not taken a weird hop off of his own defender, this game could’ve easily went on to another OT. But that’s hockey. Unfortunately you can’t stop everything and you’re going to get a bad bounce against you. Varlamov has shown the presence of mind not to let it get to him…Crosby was quiet (as far as scoring goals) but he was still a major presence on the ice. If you can’t score, then you have to help your team in other ways and he did that by winning that last face off and assisting on the important goals. Evgeni Malkin also stepped up his game, leading both teams in ice time and when Crosby couldn’t find the net, he did. If Malkin gets going, the Pens have a deadly 1-2 punch with him and Crosby and they can turn this series around… 460 Penguin fans received cell-phone messages Monday that they had won four tickets to an upcoming playoff game. That's 459 more than were supposed to receive the message. Those who received the message in error received an automated phone call and were told that a team staffer would contact them. They were to get two tickets to a regular-season game in 2009-10, a Penguins T-shirt and cap and a $25 gift card. Now here is a great example of a professional sports organization going above and beyond the call of duty to rectify a mistake it made. Other teams across sports should take note of this, particularly the New York Yankees, who after this weeks rain delay fiasco, seem to be alienating their fans more and more every day.
Information from the AP, Washington Post and Pittsburgh Gazette was used in this story.
Title Fight: Crosby vs. Ovechkin
Round 3
Crosby- 0 Goals, 2 Assists, +1, 3 Shots on Goal, 2 Hits, 28:32 Time on Ice
Ovechkin- 1 Goals, 1 Assist, +1, 3 Shots on Goal, 7 Hits, 23:44 Time on Ice
No comments:
Post a Comment