In Pittsburgh Monday night, the Anaheim Ducks came crashing back to earth in a 6-2 thumping at the hands of the Penguins.
After a slow start to his season, Sidney Crosby is heating up and scored in his seventh straight game and picked up four points on the night.
“I think [Crosby’s] game is at another level,” Penguins coach Mike Sullivan said. “And it’s consistent. It’s not just sporadic. He’s hard to handle. Most teams don’t have an answer for him when he’s playing with the passion and determination that he plays with.”
Crosby scored twice off breakaways.
“You never want to give him breakaways, that’s for sure, and leaving your goalie out to dry,” the Ducks Ryan Getzlaf said. “He’s the best player in the world for a reason. He scores goals almost at will if you let him. I don’t want to brush it off, but we’ve been playing some good hockey lately and we don’t want to put all our chips into one game.”
Marc-Andre Fleury was solid nets and made 36 saves for the win.
Olli Maatta, Carl Hagelin, Chris Kunitz, and Conor Sheary also scored for the Pens.
“If we had gone in after the first period only down one goal, we would’ve thought we won the period and I think we would’ve rebounded,” Ducks coach Bruce Boudreau said. “But that 3-1 goal (Hagelin’s) hurt and then I thought we were doing pretty well coming on in the second period, but we gave it away and Sidney gets the breakaway. Once it was 4-1, it was done.”
Patrick Maroon and Getzlaf scored for the Ducks.
John Gibson started the game and was pulled after the final Pens’ goal and replaced by Frederik Andersen.
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