Game 5 Recap: Penguins win in OT, 3-2; Claim Series 4-1

Who said Marian Hossa can't score when it counts?

After a posting in this forum earlier in the series about how Hossa needs to start capitalizing on his scoring chances, the big slovak did just that yesterday, scoring on a beautiful pass from Penguins winger Ryan Malone on a power play in the 2nd period and then, more importantly, just drilling a shot between the legs of Rangers goalie Henrik Lundqvist 7 minutes into overtime to give the Penguins a 3-2 win in game 5 and a 4-1 win in the series.

The Penguins pretty much dominated game 5, outshooting and outhitting the Rangers and carrying the play for most of the game. After jumping to a 2-0 lead going into the 3rd period, it looked like the Penguins were going to coast to their series win. However, the Rangers made it interesting, scoring two goals from unlikely sources -- rookie Lauri Korpikoski and winger Nigel Dawes -- in just over a minute early in the 3rd to set the stage for overtime. There's no question that the Penguins had a short lapse, and that's all it took to get New York back in the game.

Jaromir Jagr was held without a shot in game 5, looking nothing like he did earlier in the series. Credit Penguins coach Michel Therrein for taking advantage of having the last line change on home ice, which allowed him to match up defenseman Hal Gill and the Jordan Staal line against Jagr most of the game. A lot of the other Rangers were non-factors in this one too, including Scott Gomez, Chris Drury and Brendan Shanahan, although Drury was again playing with a known rib injury and Shanahan almost scored to give the Rangers the lead in the 3rd after tipping a point shot. Penguins goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury came up big to stop that one.

Evgeni Malkin also was a force in game 5, scoring on a nice backhander in the 2nd period to give the Penguins a 2-0 lead, and finishing with 10 shots.

As I see it, the Penguins won the series for several reasons:

1) They won the special teams battle during the cousre of the entire series, again clicking at over 20% on the power play, while shutting down the Rangers man-advantage unit;

2) Their talent and composure (especially in game 1 when they came back from a 3-0 deficit, and game 3 when they overcame a blown 3-1 lead) won out over the Rangers experience.

3) Fleury was better than Lundqvist. I personally think Lundqvist was subpar in the series. He had some strong moments, especially in games 2 and 4, and also was solid in game 5, but was less than good in games 1 and 3. He played a big role in putting the Rangers in a 3-0 hole they could not recover from. Lundqvist is talented enough to win a series by himself, but the Rangers simply couldn't afford 2 subpar games from their Vezina trophy finalist and still expect to compete with Pittsburgh, especially considering how well the Penguins have been playing.

Next up for the Penguins -- the final four. Against the team that thinks they tanked it in the last game of the regular season to avoid them: the hated Philadelphia Flyers. The Eastern Conference Final matchup between these two teams is going to be one heck of a battle. I'll break it down later in the week. For now, I'll just apologize for the fact that I'll likely be a little less objective than usual in talking about the series for the next 2 weeks. I'll do my best, but whether it's the Flyer team, fans, media or all three, something about that group just brings out the worst in me. It's more than dislike and beyond even pure hatred. It's complete and total loathing.

GO HOME FLYERS!!!