Penguins Survive Second Shark Attack

It really wasn’t pretty, but our Pittsburgh Penguins beat the San Jose Sharks 2 – 1 last night in Over Time (OT). If this had been a weeknight game, I would never have been able to stay up and watch it. Thankfully, it wasn’t a weeknight, and the final score made the game worth the late hour.

Last night’s game was in a lot of ways the opposite of the Penguins first meeting with Sharks. In the first meeting, our waddling waterfowl frolicked in the first period potting 6 Goals (G) on 17 Shots on Goal (SOG). The 17 SOG gave them a heavy edge in SOG, 17-10. Last night, San Jose pummeled our Penguins 11 – 4 in SOG. On January 2, our boys in black-and-gold jumped out to a 4 – 0 lead before the Sharks woke up. Last night, they fell behind 1 – 0 and needed Kris Letang to pull them even before the Period ended.

Rudolphs Balcers opened the scoring up for the bad guys at 7:01 pf the 1^st Period. Mike Matheson went “D” to “D” just inside his own blue line to escape a Shark forecheck. Chad Ruhwedel to his Defensive partners pass and drifted back to the top of his own Right Wing (RW) Face Off circle, suckering the San Jose forechecker with him, while Kasperi Kapanen and Evgeni Malkin crisscrossed and headed back up ice. Ruhwedel then tried to find Jeff Carter at the Red Line but the Sharks didn’t give him any time or space. Back-checkers jumped all over him. Kapanen tried to help, but out manned 3 – 2, the Sharks knifed back on the attack.

 Having lost the puck and the Sharks driving back into his own zone, Carter opted to bail on the play and jumped off the ice, leaving Jake Guentzel to try and race back into the play.

Matheson then tried to step up and break up the attack but got caught reaching. The Penguins Defenseman didn’t have a good gap and in typical Penguin fashion, Matheson simply waived his stick at the oncoming Timo Meier and the Sharks broke in behind the Penguins with a slick behind the back pass off the boards to Erik Karlsson. The Offensive minded Karlsson had broke in to deep and had to retrace his steps to take the pass. With his back to the net to take the pass, Karlsson spun and fired the puck toward to Balcers sneaking in on the weak side. When Balcers tapped the puck past Louis Domingue, 2 Sharks were behind the Penguins’ defense.

Letang knotted the score 1 – 1 at 10:56. The play started with Brian Dumoulin swinging behind his own net and found Teddy Blueger in his own Left Wing (LW) Face Off circle. Blueger relayed the puck up ice on a stretch pass to Guentzel. Guentzel one touched the puck to Letang in full flight down the RW. Letang flew in behind the Sharks “D” on a break. He froze the Sharks Goalie, Adin Hill with a fake shot then turned it over on the backhand to deposit the puck in the net.

For the rest of regulation time, it was Domingue and the Penguins Penalty Kill (PK) stealing the show. Domingue rejected all 30 SOG he faced over the final 2 frames: many of those SOG coming thanks to a rare careless High Sticking penalty taken by Guentzel and 2 bad penalties (Interference and Cross-Checking) taking by Marcus Pettersson. Fortunately, Domingue and the PK withstood the assault.

Finally, Guentzel potted his 19^th of the season in OT. With tons, and tons of time and space that 3-on-3 hockey provides, Letang sent Sidney Crosby up ice on a 3-line pass (aren’t you glad they got rid of that bothersome 2-line pass years ago). Crosby broke down his off Wing and skated across the top of the slot, getting Hill moving left to right and allowing Guentzel to get position on the Sharks “D”. With all of that time and space, Crosby slid a pass back across the slot and Guentzel tipped it in at 37s of OT and the Penguins escaped San Jose with a Win.

Odds and Sods

• Donmingue’ 40 save effort in his Penguins debut earned him 1^st Star honors.
• Guentzel and his Game Wining Goal and assist on Letang’s G grabbed 2^nd Star honors.
• Another highlight I found in the game was when coached Mike Sullivan stumbled on the line of Radim Zohorna with Carter and Malkin. Many of Penguins’ fans, a lot of them here on these boards have been clamoring for Big “Z” to be put on Malkin’s line and that size and skill did create havoc on the Sharks, dominating the advanced stats with a CORSI of 70% – here is to seeing more of that line.
• The Penguins suffered horribly in the Face Off circle, winning 18 and losing 36 draws.
• Is there a Goalie controversy? Last time our Pens played San Jose, Casey DeSmith got shelled and chased from the game. Last night Domingue stood on his head to steal the show. If you recall, I did think that both Domingue and Filip Lindberg outplayed DeSmith in the preseason, but Sullivan chose DeSmith.
• Hey Mike, did a little of our friend Rick Buker rub off on you. No sooner than you besmirched Samuel Poulin and Nathan Légaré that these guys both scored Gs last night for the Baby Penguins in Wilkes Barre – Scranton (WBS), in their 5 – 2 victory over Lehigh Valley. Poulin had an assist Friday night as well and started the game on a line with Jan Drozg and newcomer Alexander Nylander. Légaré finished a plus 2 nights in a row. If you have Rick Buker disease (you made it Rick – you have a disease named after you, LOL), start talking bad about all the Penguins’ players.
• No, WBS didn’t win because of Goaltending. The WBS defense limited Lehigh Valley to 22 SOG.
• Valterri Puustenin opened the scoring for WBS with his 11^th G of the season – and I laughed when the team drafted him 203^rd overall, in the 7^th round in 2019, mainly because he is listed as 5’-9” on Elite Prospects. Morbid curiosity (I say morbid because I thought this would be a wasted pick) kept me following him over the next 2 seasons where he notched 38 G in 105 GP for HPK in Liiga. Those numbers made me want to see him play. So far, in the preseason for the big club and down in WBS he isn’t disappointing me. He may never play in Pittsburgh but I am now hoping this kid makes it to the NHL.