Monday, March 31, 2008

Rangers 2, Penguins 1 (OT)

This one would fall under the category of "at least they got a point". If this was a playoff game, it would be a heart breaker. Fortunately for us, it's just a relatively meaningless regular season game.

No big recap tonight, mainly because the game didn't have that much to write about. In fact, for about the first half, the Pens had ONE shot. One. Shot. Ugh.

The Pens were hit with a double minor midway through the second period. Taffe and Whitney were both sent off at the same time. Congrats to Versus for showing us absolutely nothing about the penalties.

The Rangers took advantage with a fluke goal on a shot by Jagr. It went straight up off of Fleury, off the glove of Scuderi and off of the mask of Fleury again, into the net. Dumb luck, but that's after the Rangers had hit the crossbar and post in a two second span.

With 10 minutes left in the game, Laraque passed the puck to Talbot with a nifty backhand saucer pass. Max entered the zone and passed to Malone busting down the right side. Ryan threw a backhand pass right back to Mad Max, who went across the grain along the ice to beat Lundqvist.

In OT, Jagr drew a penalty, putting the Rangers on the power play. Drury won the game on a shot that went through approximately 67 people. There was no way for Fleury to stop it.

Fleury was the reason the Pens escaped with a point. He was magnificent. He stopped Nigel Dawes on a breakaway and made every other save he could have, especially during the first period when the Pens were on their heels. True to clueless New York form, Fleury wasn't one of the three stars of the game. Morons.

Lundqvist WAS one of the three stars, and it was well deserved. He made several great saves, and the Pens had a few golden chances they just couldn't get good wood on.

Orpik was everywhere. He plastered Jagr more than once, which as we all know is not an easy thing to do. Jagr is strong on his skates even when he's weak in the heart.

About the only positive to come out of this was that the Sens are now in the 6th spot in the East. If they're not careful, they're going to slide right out of the playoffs.

Okay, it's also good that the Pens got to 100 points on the season. Pretty nice accomplishment.

Next up: The Flyers come to the Igloo on Wednesday night for the final regular season home game of the year. These divisional games are really getting the Pens warmed up for the playoffs.

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