Sidney Crosby Puts up Three Points as Penguins Win in Epic Shootout
The Pittsburgh Penguins take their second win in as many nights on the back of a huge game from their captain.
Traveling north of the boarder, the Pittsburgh Penguins looked for their second win in as many nights when they dropped the puck against the Montreal Canadiens.
Both teams entered the contest with almost identical records, hovering just around .500, but the Penguins looked to take advantage of recent successes and find some consistency in the win column.
They brought a badly injured lineup to Montreal, but the main pieces were still around and looking to keep up their good work.
First Period
One of those good pieces had a tough start to the night; Erik Karlsson had a pair of awful turnovers in the opening minutes with only one of them getting bailed out.
A second long pass was picked off by the Canadiens and wound up behind Alex Nedeljkoivc with relative ease.
The Canadiens took a two-goal advantage later in the period when defenseman Jayden Struble took the puck end to end before finding a scoring opportunity in the slot.
Sidney Crosby wouldn’t be denied and looked to will the Penguins back into the game; he forced a turnover behind the Canadiens net before a soft touch on net.
Crosby’s shot played almost like a golf chip shot over the Canadiens’ netminder to put to Penguins on the board.
Despite being withing one, the Penguins couldn’t help but go back down by two tallies following a Marcus Pettersson penalty.
The Penguins penalty kill has been leaking goals against the last few games and the Canadiens took full advantage of their opportunity.
It was the second straight four-goal first period involving the Penguins, but this time around they were down 3-1 while being badly outplayed.
Second Period
Early in the second frame, the Penguins were given a power play opportunity, but it was all but wasted until the Canadiens took a too many men on the ice penalty with a second left on their kill.
With an extra two minutes to work with a man advantage, the Penguins recorded a power play goal in the second straight game.
The Penguins power play went from no production in 13 straight games to goals in back-to-back nights, with Jake Guentzel standing as the catalyst.
Still behind by one, the Penguins were given another chance on the power play and as if the 0-36 streak never happened, Crosby teed up another power play goal.
It wasn’t immediately clear who scored with Valtteri Puustinen initially getting credit for his first career goal, but it was eventually given to Crosby for his second of the night.
Crosby was literally milliseconds away from a hat trick, but time had just run out on the period before the puck bounced off of his leg into a yawning cage.
After an awful performance through the first period, the Penguins bounced back in a huge way to dominate the second frame.
A pair of goals on 15 shots to knot the game at three, the Penguins were right back in the fight and carrying momentum.
Third Period
For the third straight game, the Penguins entered the final frame tied with their opponent and needed to be the better team for the final 20 once again.
For the better part of the period, neither offense could do much of anything; the Penguins only had two shots on goal through most of the frame, Nedeljkovic was standing tall in net.
With about three minutes remaining, Drew O'Connor took a goaltender interference penalty to give the Canadiens a chance, but the Penguins killed of the minor.
After a four-goal first and a second period carried by the Penguins, these two teams put together a scoreless third and forced overtime in Montreal.
Overtime/Shootout
The Penguins secured at least a point, but so did the Canadiens keeping these two right next to each other in the standings no matter who scored next.
After about a minute of the overtime frame, Evgeni Malkin took a penalty to give the Canadiens yet another man advantage.
The Penguins killed off Malkin's minor and no whistles followed finishing the overtime period at 4-on-4 but without a winner.
For the second time of the season, the Penguins were heading to a shootout.
Each of the first four shooters found twine before the goalies stood tall to make the next handful of saves.
In the sixth round of the shootout, Nedeljkovic was half run over by Christian Dvorak and he was clearly shaken up, but stayed in the game.
Ned missed the next chance, but Lars Eller notched one against his former team to extend the shootout to round eight.
In the 12th round of the shootout, with the bench running thin, Jansen Harkins scored in his first career attempt to give the Penguins the win.
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