Penguins/NHL
Penguins 5 – 
Canadiens 3
PIT GAME LEADERS
Jake Guentzel | Goal (21), 2 Assist
Sidney Crosby | Goal (24), Assist
Evgeni Malkin | Goal (41), Assist
Derick Brassard | Goal (20, GWG)
Phil Kessel | 2 Assists
Casey DeSmith | 27 Saves, .900 SV%
CROSBY’s MOMENTUM CHANGING GOAL
The Pittsburgh blew a 2-0 lead and trailed 3-2 late in the second period against the lowly Montreal Canadiens until a dazzling goal from Sidney Crosby tied the game at 3-3 with 4:58 left in the period and Pittsburgh re-took control of the game in a 5-3 victory over the Canadiens on Wednesday night at the PPG Paints Arena.
Crosby’s 24th of the season was certainly a top-10 goal of his career from a highlight reel standpoint and it was a goal in a big situation, scoring 38 seconds after the Canadiens went up 3-2 as Pittsburgh was potentially heading into another situation of handing a game to another bad opponent which has been a theme over the last week.
“It was a huge goal for us,” Mike Sullivan said. “To go in after two periods with a tie game was really important for us.”
BRASSARD, GUENTZEL CLOSE OUT THE GAME
Derick Brassard scored 2:38 into the third period, scoring a blistering goal from the slot on the power play off a setup from Jake Guentzel for his 20th of the season to put the Penguins ahead 4-3 and then Guentzel closed the game out with a 1:33 remaining, beating Carey Price blocker side to cap off a three point night.
The Brassard game winning goal was a needed one for him. It was just his second goal as a Penguin but he is on a four game points streak now. The Penguins coaches, though, want to tap in to that goal scoring ability more for Brassard.
He can bury the puck from goal scorer areas and Mike Sullivan said afterwards he would like to find more minutes for Brassard.
“Quite honestly I’d like to find him more minutes in the game,” Sullivan said of Brassard.
TAKEAWAYS
— Jake Guentzel had a very strong night in closing out the game. He factored in on the final three goals of the game, picking up 2 primary assists and the late goal. His play away from the puck was also fantastic vs the Canadiens.
Pittsburgh’s top line was at 60% in driving possession in the win.
— Sidney Crosby’s spectacular goal was just his 24th goal in 74 games this season as it’s gone a bit unnoticed of the significant dip he’s had in goal scoring production this season.
Crosby last season had 44 goals in 75 games.
— Evgeni Malkin with a goal and assist in the win is now up to 41 goals and 50 assists on the season. His 91 points is the highest scoring season from a Penguin since Sidney Crosby’s 104 points season in 2013-2014, the last season of the Dan Bylsma era.
Quite crazy when you’re talking about Evgeni Malkin, but this is also the first season Malkin has topped more than 72 points in a season since 2011-2012.
— Casey DeSmith earned his 5th win of the season and as he’s been most nights he’s been good enough to put the Penguins in position to win.
What’s interesting with the backup goaltender situation is while the Penguins obviously don’t have a Marc Andre Fleury behind Matt Murray to go to in the playoffs if needed, which could become problematic if another injury to Matt Murray happens, Pittsburgh has actually received slightly better backup goaltending during the regular season with the combo of DeSmith/Jarry then they did last season where Fleury had a very mediocre regular season before his game took off in the playoffs.
Casey DeSmith | 5-4-1, .913 SV%, .262 GAA
Tristan Jarry | 14-6-2, 2.77 GAA, .908 Sv%
Marc Andre Fleury last season: 18-10-7, 3.02 GAA, .909 SV%
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Once again pens needed 4 in order to win and once again they lost to a backup goalie. ZeroTool can you bring up the stats out of how many pens loses this year was vs back up goalies and if pens lead that chart too
Sams blissfully unaware that MAF was basically good for at least one really bad goal per game and from 2010 headed down such a shit path for 5 years that he needed to hire a professional. You have selective memory because you’re a fucken retard.
Diego is right though, the team could be better served rescuing price from that dumpster fire in Montreal while moving Letang off this roster!
How is oilers doing another coaching change coming ? How many now since last time they went to the finals
? Why are you so hung up on me being some sort of an Oilers fan. You literally talk about them more than I do. In fact I never bring them up lol. You have more than established you are a Habs fan 1st, a Vegas fan second and based on how often you bring them up probably a Tampa fan 3rd. You’re a Crosby dick rider and thats the only reason why you are here
Entertaining game, Pens guilty of playing 40… Letang on the ice for fucking three including the last one where he left his post hard! Murray had a few WTF moments and a lot of lucky ones but ultimately didn’t look great in his second game back from a month off… Disappointing loss at the end of the day… too bad, was a great response when down. Letangs a fucken disaster again, getting close to panic time! They have a piss pore attitude with the partial games being played. Cole left a large hole and as well as Brassard has played… Read more »
With this defense Murray is going to have to play out of his mind. This team may be better off taking an early exit, get some rest and try an shed some dead weight. A lot of issues need to be addressed.
This team is running out of gas. On a position be note brassard is signed for another year
Can’t defend Sheary anymore. What his wrong with his stick handling.
Gotta get Kessel on Malkins wing.
Any update on Aston-Reese? I’d love to see him come back and replace Sheary.
Not soon enough
Or It’s A Great Day To Play One Period Of Hockey.
The Pittsburgh Penguins…. We make struggling teams look amazing.
I think Sullivan’s plan is to play Letang so much he drops dead and that will void his contract. There is no other explaination.
Outlier game for Oleksiak.
Pens should sign him now before he’s worth more than league minimum.
Pens are probably tired from long west coast trip
Letang behind the net inexplicably. The more you watch him, the worse he gets.
He had to make sure he was in the trapazoid so he wouldn’t take a penalty lol.
He’s unwatchable.
Sign and trade deal – Carey Price for Murray and Letang.
The Devils 1st 4 on 4 goal of the year.
St.Blurry Murray.
What is Murray doing there? He’s fuucking atrocious
Have to finish some of these chances. Come on now
Lol. Murray is soooooo overrated.
God awful goal
Fuk this D and Murray!!!!!!
Sullivan has made all the right moves and tough personnel calls. Now he needs to get Letang off the PP.
Wow did Taylor Hall just abuse Letang. What a waste of 7mil.
Who doesn’t abuse Letang?
If anyone has Direct TV I hear the Pens / Devils game will be in 4K.
Fleury is hurt again. Very unreliable.
I guess his time with Murray rubbed off on him.
If that’s true I guess I’m putting 100k on Vegas to win the cup…
He is? It says he’s with the team in Colorado and will be returning to action. When is last year’s Murray gonna return to the ice?
I was just thinking about everything I hate about French Canadians.
50 bucks says -5am +5s this lol
Congrats to Vegas becoming 1st expansion team in history to earn 100 points on their first season
You must be excited your new favourite team accomplished something so unique. Too bad they had to do it with out MAF because he is injured yet AGAIN!
Rip former dolphin, panthers owner. Panthers also retire number 37 since that was the birth year and lucky number of the owner also that will be the only number they well ever retire since organization sucksss
Classy…
They went to the super bowl a couple years ago. Far, far more success than Montreal in the last 2 decades
Montreal is 9-28 on the road this year.
Wash, CBJ and Philly all winners tonight. $hit is getting annoying.
That is why losing to none playoff teams is killing them.
Congrats, beating a team that lost 3 in a row and 8 of it’s last 9 and they still didn’t look good doing it. They scored 1 goal against the Islanders and Tampa has 7 in just two periods. These are the games you are supposed to win.
Agreed, fuckk the W and the positives in the response when we can lament not winning good enough.
Tampa also gave up 6. We won by two without an EN. Are we supposed to win by 3 or 4?
#insultposting
-5am is agents.
Rumours have Fleury diagnosed with his second concussion of the season….
-5am?
Rds was saying habs should go hard on tavares this summer slight talks been prior with his agent. If not. Habs should try to bring kovalchuck since he wants to come back next year. Also heard price might be gone maybe to sabres for eichel which I am agents that since you never build a team around Americans been proven fact
Yeah, it’s working out horribly for the Leafs. Remember you said you didn’t have an agenda? Lol. I’ve never met a more worthless person in my life.
“you are agents” LMMFAO… remember that team from the 90s? One of the better teams through that entire era? Oh ya… Dallas… Who was the key guy they built around… was that Mike Modano?
I was thinking more recently like the Chicago Blackhawks winning 3 Cups on the back of Patrick Kane. Who by the way is American.
Ya but then we cant blame Toews for them missing this year lol
Fair point.
Looks like they are inadvertently going after the #1 overall pick
If they get it. I’m calling a Dahlin/John Carlson swap in 2020.
Just read an interview where they asked Tavares about playing in Montreal… he said he would rather retire, in fact he contemplates feigning injury everytime the Islanders even go to Montreal.
Your Mom would go hard on him.
Nice to. See that the. Rogue period has. Made it’s. Return
Need 6 with Price.
Montreal sucks
What a confusing night for -5am. His favorite player finally shows and scores a great goal but that great goal beats his favorite team in the process. To paraphrase the great Mike Lange “-5am didn’t know whether to cream his pants or cry like a little girl”.
Like I said, the big names all showed up and they fought through a poor start. Much better than the period night regardless of opponent. It was the beating of the adversity they created that I liked. That said they need to get out of the habit of sleeping through parts of their game which has haunted them much of the year. Gatjka also showed an interesting stat in relation to goaltending overall.. while the data was taken as Murray was finally on the upswing the teams goalies up and down year has also provided some of the concerns we… Read more »
If they’re not playing well going into the pnayoffs than they won’t / can’t flip a switch. What you see over the next few weeks is what you’re going to get.
Hence not much time left. Like you said they won’t flip a switch so hopefully they can build off the second half of this game and get back to what they looked like in January before mid-April
Like the news about malkin since 2011. Just like I pointed out few weeks ago But don’t tell zerotool about.
Hes been well over a PPG in that period retard. He also had 72 points last fucken year! He has managed to stay healthy all season and is suddenly leaving Crosby in his dust lol. It is funny tho… the last time the Pens had a scorer at this level was under Bylsma… interesting hey
Blow it up