The three-game sweep of the NHL starts in Glendale, Arizona where the Coyotes hosted the Pittsburgh Penguins Saturday night.
Jordan Martinook‘s first NHL goal and a marker from Tobias Rieder sent the Coyotes to a 2-1 win over the Pens to improve to 2-0-0 on the young season.
Mike Smith made 27 saves in the win.
“You saw those first few games we had and I don’t know how many people would have given us a [2-0-0] record,” said Smith, who has made saves on 67 of 69 shots he’s faced and been named First Star in each game. “You’d be pretty surprised, given where we are picked to finish in the League.
“For the guys that have been here, it’s a breath of fresh air. And for the new guys to come in and experience what it takes to win in this league, it will go a long way.”
Smith shone in the third with some spectacular saves as the Pens pushed the play.
“Smith has been outstanding, and as a team I thought we played better than we did the first game,” Arizona coach Dave Tippett said. “We have veteran players who are doing the job and young players who are earning ice time at the end of the game. We want to be a hardworking team and we’ll see where that takes us.”
Phil Kessel scored for the Penguins.
“We had some good chances late when we got desperate and they started to sit on the lead, but it just took way too long to generate those chances,” said Pittsburgh captain Sidney Crosby, who didn’t have a shot on goal in either of the first two games and was held pointless on the trip. “I haven’t had a ton of opportunities to shoot. I think you have to really work hard to get into those positions and I have to do a better job of getting there and getting pucks to the net.”
Pittsburgh is now -0-2-0 to start the season.
In Vancouver, the Calgary Flames needed a goal from Johnny Gaudreau with less than two minutes left in overtime to get past the Canucks, 3-2.
The Flames also needed a rally of sorts in the third period when they trailed 2-1. Sean Monahan‘s goal midway through the frame got them to OT.
“This was the Calgary Flames,” Bob Hartley said after coaching his 100th Flames win. “Third period we were skating well, our puck possession was real good. Then in OT, just open the floodgates and watch. Johnny always wants to be the difference-maker and once again, here he is.”
Dougie Hamilton picked up the Flames first goal of the game.
Bo Horvat and Jared McCann scored for the Canucks.
“I almost blacked out to be honest,” McCann said. “It was a great feeling, but obviously it would have been nice to end the way we wanted.” He had jumped hard into the glass after the goal.
Ryan Miller‘s 35 saves were not enough to get the win.
“It’s frustrating to have a lead in our building in the third period and give it up,” Miller said. “But we’re going to have to go with the good and the bad and there was some good stuff tonight.”
Jonas Hiller made 28 saves for the win after losing the opener badly.
“It’s not really the game plan to go down but I thought we had not a bad start,” Hiller said. “Everybody in here believes, we know we’ve done it before, but the other way would be nicer.”
In Toronto, the Maple Leafs got closer to a win but still lost, this time in a shootout to the Ottawa Senators, 5-4.
The Sens’ got a goal in the skills portion of the game from Mike Hoffman to get the win.
“I haven’t been too good in the shootouts,” Hoffman said with a laugh. “The ice was really choppy so it’s almost tough to deke that late. As you saw, there weren’t too many dekes. I had it set in my mind before I even hopped on the ice.”
After trailing 3-0 and 4-3, the Leafs found a way to rally to get a point in the loss.
“I thought our team did a lot of really good things,” captain Dion Phaneuf said. “You’re down 3-0 and you come back, I think that is a big, big sign of character. I’m really happy with the way the team responded. We knew we dug a bit of a hole, but there are a lot of positives to build on.”
Craig Anderson had 37 saves in the win and James Reimer had 29 saves for the Leafs.
“I thought we worked real hard,” Babcock said. “What I liked about it is we have had a tendency when things go bad to feel bad and we seem to be fragile and we don’t seem to just keep on playing. Tonight I thought we kept playing.
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