The Penguins keep the same 18 skaters for two games in a row for the first time all season, but continue to rotate goalies and give Arturs Silovs the game against his former team.
The Vancouver Petterssons Canucks bring a banged up lineup at this point of their road trip.
The Canucks strike 1:18 into the game on the first shot of the night. Ryan Shea gets caught stationary and Elias Pettersson (the good one) throws a puck up for Conor Garland. Garland fires a slapper past Silovs. 1-0 right off the bat.
Each team gets a power play, the less said the better about the Pens’ who pass around the perimeter when they’re not getting passes intercepted and taken the other way.
Pittsburgh’s fourth line has been their best of the night in the early going, and they grind out a goal. All three forwards circle and swarm down low and near the front of the net. Noel Acciari kicks the puck (well, passes it with a stick anyways) back out to the point and Parker Wotherspoon sends a shot in from long-range. Vancouver’s P.O. Joseph just kinda stands in front of the net and lets Connor Dewar get a tip on the puck and in past Kevin Lankinen. That looked very familiar. 1-1 game.
Pittsburgh gets another power play for Vancouver having too many men on the ice, it goes even worst than the first one. The camera shows Aaron Rodgers in the house and there’s a joke to be made about old guys telegraphing pass attempts that the other team steps in front of, heyoo. Luckily the Canucks don’t score on the Pittsburgh power play.
Shots go 11-5 VAN in the first. Not unusual to have a choppy start after returning home from a long-distance road trip and the Pens certainly fell into that category.
The second goes a lot better for the Pens, who get their legs under them a little more and play better than the early going. Ben Kindel did well to intercept a pass and turn it into a nice shot for himself, a little later Harrison Brunicke turned on the jets to angle off Evander Kane and interrupt him with a perfectly timed stick on the puck. Nice showing from the young players.
Former Penguin Drew O’Connor takes an offensive zone penalty, the first group didn’t play well but Tommy Novak stepped up to score his first goal as a Penguin when he got plenty of time and space, used it and fired a hard shot by Lankinen. 2-1 Pens.
The first line makes an appearance, Sidney Crosby snags a puck after an offensive zone faceoff he doesn’t take, holds it and scores short side on Lankinen. 3-1 game.
Then it’s the second line’s turn to join the party and they do in the next minute. Evgeni Malkin swoops towards the net and fires a high shot that hits Lankinen in the shoulder and drops as a juicy rebound. Fellow mutant Anthony Mantha goes hard to the crease and slams it home. 4-1 game
Three goals in a 3:08 stretch towards the end of the period caps off one of the finest 20-minute segments the Pens have had in the young season so far. They deserved to punch through, out-shooting Vancouver 14-3 in the frame.
Malkin goes to the penalty box early, the Pens kill off Vancouver’s chance to get back in the game and then Mantha draws a penalty to send Pittsburgh to their fourth power play of the night. It’s a repeat of the earlier one, the stars don’t do that much, the second group scores late. Kris Letang makes a nice zone entry with a hard pass off the back wall, Mantha gains control and bumps the puck over for Justin Brazeau. Big Braz does what he’s been doing so far this season, scores from in front for his fifth goal of the season. It marks Letang’s 600th career assist.
Filip Hallander heads to the penalty box next for another Vancouver power play chance that Pittsburgh deals with. Joseph takes a late penalty and Pittsburgh rides out the clock.
- This version of the Pens fourth line is scrappy. They’ll battle and they actually have been getting some rewards for their efforts lately. It would be nice if they weren’t quite so noticeable and being the team’s most visible players (the trio combined for seven of the team’s 15 total shot attempts in the first), but hey, it’s good news for them. They’ll get after it on the forecheck, are all around the dirty areas and chipping in some goals lately. You never know how long that will last but it’s a fun watch when they go over the boards for a shift. Couldn’t often say that about the lower lines of the Pens in years past when they were dragging around a Jeff Carter or Kevin Hayes.
- Tonight was the first time Drew O’Connor played against the Penguins, and the first time back in Pittsburgh for Marcus Pettersson and P.O. Joseph since departing the club. Quiet night for all three, aside from each taking a penalty. O’Connor’s proved to be an unknowing but fateful turning point on the night; it was on that power play that the Pens made it 2-1 and then the score rolled to 4-1 quickly after.
- The Pens have been waiting for a streaky player like Novak to heat up, and luckily that might be happening. Novak only had 7 shots on goal in the first six games (and just one in the last two games) and then – boom, three SOG tonight and his first goal of the season. He’s a guy who can run hot and cold and it’d be nice if he starts making regular appearances on the scoresheet.
- Along those lines for complimentary wingers that always leave one wanting a little more, it was a very positive sign to see Mantha driving the net and finishing with authority. He’s a player that over his career has been knocked for not always using his monstrous size and playing with enough of an edge down low, he literally scored from right inside of the net following the puck into it. If Mantha can keep that type of fire in the belly and put himself in that position with frequency then he’s going to have a great season.
- One player with everything going right is Brazeau. What a signing that has been. One goal and two assists on the night boosts him to eight points in seven games to start the season.
- The goalie usage from Dan Muse has been intriguing. The even rotation of games has not stopped, even after Tristan Jarry earned a shutout last game. Can’t knock the results, or the rationale to have Silovs play against his former team/organization. Given Muse’s long hours and meticulous work, it’s fun to imagine he’s had this cooking since the summer to figure out how he would set this up. Whether it’s that worked out exactly that way or been more fluid, it’s looking genius either way. Helps when both of the goalies are playing well enough to the point it makes it impossible to pick a bad option. Silovs stopped the last 23 shots he saw and bounced back from the early breakdown to make the rest of the game look pretty easy. Earned what had to be a very satisfying win personally for him coming against a team that couldn’t or wasn’t willing to find a spot in the NHL for him.
- Malkin took his first penalty of the season, almost seven games in! His penchant for going to the box is over-stated in some quarters as an out-of-proportion pet peeve (not to mention fairly inaccurate since for instance, Malkin ‘only’ took 19 minors last season, and drew 25 calls for being impeded) but we were wondering when he was going to take his first trip to the sin bin this year. Made it quite a while, hopefully he scores another 10 points again before his next one.
- Nice night on special teams with the Pittsburgh power play going 2/5 and the PK turning in a perfect 3/3 effort. That’s a good way to comfortably win a game when that side of the game is in order, with a lot of credit due to the second group for lifting the team up there.
- A couple milestones on the night: Crosby’s goal gave him more regular season+playoff points than Mario Lemieux, in an obscure one. Letang became the 20th defenseman to notch 600 career assists. Of those 19, three are still active (Brent Burns, Victor Hedman and teammate Erik Karlsson) so 16 are Hockey Hall of Fame eligible. 15 of them are in, Gary Suter from the wide open ’80s and early 90’s being only one in the club that isn’t in the HHOF.
Vancouver was a banged up bunch towards the end of a long road trip, but such is life sometimes in the NHL. They were an opponent that was in a good position to pick on, and the Pens took advantage of it to do just that and skate away for what ended up being a relatively drama-free win, and their third victory in a row. Quality performance that they deserve to gain some confidence in how they’ve been playing lately. They’ll need it, next up Pittsburgh gets a chance to see how they measure up on Thursday against the back-to-back Stanley Cup champions down in Florida.
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