RALEIGH, NC – For six minutes it was all there for the Hurricanes in their return home, a screaming crowd in full-support, a buzzing offense that had already given the team the first goal of the game and a goaltender who was making saves. Then it all fell apart and with it the Hurricanes magical season is for all intents and purposes over. After taking the early lead Carolina appeared to have an excellent chance of winning their first game of the series against Pittsburgh, but a detected slash by Carolina’s Patrick Eaves at the 6:15 mark of the first period stalled the Hurricanes attack. For the second night in a row it would be Pittsburgh’s Evgeni Malkin who would be the difference.
Malkin scored his first goal of the game when he converted a give-away by Hurricanes defenseman Tim Gleason. Malkin captured the puck and moved in on Hurricanes netminder Cam Ward before beating him with a shot from the slot. Despite the momentum changing affairs Carolina hung in with Pittsburgh before the Penguins picked up a pair of goals with under a minute to play in the opening frame.
Just when it appeared the Hurricanes would have a chance to re-group, disaster struck in the form of the Penguins dynamic duo. Sidney Crosby scored the first goal of two goals in the space of 41 seconds when he back-handed a cross-crease pass from Bill Guerin into Carolina’s goal. Malkin struck again when he waltzed in on Ward along the goal line to the left of the goaltender and fired the puck in from close range.
Despite the back-breaking goals and a shift in momentum Pittsburgh still couldn’t put the Hurricanes away because Ward was doing his best to leave his club in the game. Ward robbed Pittsburgh’s Maxime Talbot twice, including once on a third period breakaway, Jordan Staal from in close and Chris Kunitz from the goal mouth giving Carolina a chance to get back in the game.
Early in the third period Carolina did just that when Sergei Samsonov drew his club to within one as he knocked an Erik Cole rebound past Pittsburgh’s Marc-Andre Fleury. The Hurricanes had their chances to even the game, but Pittsburgh’s defensive acumen kept the Carolina club on the periphery.
The tide finally turned when Malkin teamed with Ruslan Fedotenko to give Pittsburgh a 4-2 lead. Malkin took the puck into the Hurricanes zone before dropping it to Fedotenko, who then fired the puck across the grain and into the Carolina goal.
Former Carolina skater Craig Adams added an insurance goal when he and Carolina’s Jussi Jokinen combined off a face-off to knock the puck the length of the ice into Carolina’s open goal. Guerin put the final nail in the coffin when he knocked in a back-hander from the slot for the final goal of the evening.
Carolina had their best start to a game in the series when they attacked the Penguins from the opening face-off and went ahead on Matt Cullen’s goal off a feed from Eaves. Ward kept the game as it was when he made a stunning save on Kunitz’s rebound attempt. Then Eaves opened the door for Pittsburgh with his infraction. Now the Hurricanes find themselves one loss away from elimination. Even though the final score read 6-2, the game was much closer than the score would indicate.
“It doesn’t feel easy, I can tell you that. Tonight was a difficult game, in a lot of aspects,” said Pittsburgh coach Dan Bylsma. “They got the lead. Their building was very good throughout the night. They got the goal there two minutes into the third period to make it a one-goal game. And we know they’re going to keep coming and keep working.”
“We just want to keep focused on playing the right way,” continued Bylsma. “The better we can execute the puck, the quicker we can get to the offensive zone and manage the puck into the neutral zone, the more we can play in the offensive zone.”
The two clubs will rest up for two days and then face-off for Game 4 on Tuesday, May 26. Should the Penguins win the game they will play in the Stanley Cup Finals for the second consecutive season. Should Carolina win the two clubs will return to Pennsylvania for Game 5 in Pittsburgh on Thursday, May 26.
“Our challenge will be to find a way to beat them once,” said Carolina head coach Paul Maurice. “Then we’ll try to revisit that (winning four straight). But we’re not looking at beating Pittsburgh four times. We need one game…after two days here, it’s not going to hurt their team any, but it will be a benefit to us. We’ll at least try to get some of our quickness back in our game, and back in our legs that we’re struggling with right now.”
Notes
With his three-point outing Malkin has picked up multiple points in his last six games. The feat has not been accomplished since Dale Hawerchuk did it with Buffalo during the 1993 season. Malkin has six goals and three assists in the first three games of this series and his 28 points in this year’s playoffs are the most since Carolina’s Eric Staal registered the same amount during the 2006 season. With Malkin’s next point he will have registered more points than any other player since Colorado’s Joe Sakic had 34 during the Avalanche’s Stanley Cup winning 1996 season…If the Penguins win the series they will become the first Stanley Cup runner-up to make the Final in the next year since the Edmonton Oilers, who lost to the New York Islanders in 1983 and beat that same club in 1984. The odds are against the Hurricanes as only the 1942 Toronto Maple Leafs and 1975 New York Islanders have overcome three-game deficits to win a series…Before their loss tonight the Hurricanes had been 5-0 in the playoffs in games in which they scored first…With 58 points in his first 41 games Crosby has more playoff points than any other player in NHL history had before his twenty-second birthday…Tuomo Ruutu was back in the lineup for Carolina after missing Game 2 with an undisclosed lower body injury. Ruutu, Ryan Bayda and Rod Brind’Amour each played less than ten minutes during the game for the Hurricanes…Due to Chicago’s win over the Detroit Red Wings in Game 3, the Stanley Cup Finals will not begin earlier than planned. Game 1 of the finals will be played at the home of the Western Conference championship on June 5. Had both series been finished by May 26 the Finals would have started May 28.
Contact tom.schettino@prohockeynews.com Catch all the playoffs at Intotheboards.net
You must be logged in to post a comment.