Penguins Ride Geno's HT to Storm Hurricanes, 7-4; Take 2-0 Series Lead

Going into last night's game 2 of the Eastern Conference Finals against the Pittsburgh Penguins, the Carolina Hurricanes were buoyed, no pun intended, by the way they played in game 1.

They felt that if they were able to produce a bit more offensively, get an expected better performance from goaltender Cam Ward, and do as good a job as they did in game 1 against Pens' stars Evgeni Malkin and Sidney Crosby, they'd continue their trend of winning game 2 after losing game 1 -- as they have done in their last 5 playoff series' -- and get right back into this one.

Uh, no.

Carolina produced more offensively all right, thanks to a somewhat pourous effort by Pittsburgh netminder Marc-Andre Fleury and the Penguins' defense around the net.

But Ward was worse in game 2 than he was in game 1, and the dynamic duo of Crosby and Malkin rolled all over Carolina to the tune of a 7-4 Penguins' victory.

Geno led the way for the Penguins, finishing his first career playoff hat trick with a signature goal in the third period and adding an assist, while Crosby also had a goal and an assist for the unstoppable Pittsburgh offense.

Crosby started the race last night by tying an NHL record with his 6th game-opening goal of the postseason 2 minutes in, taking a nice pass from LW Chris Kunitz and rapping it by Ward to give Pittsburgh a 1-0 lead.

While Carolina did what it does best and come right back with a tying goal by Chad Larose 1 minute later, Malkin scored his first goal of the night about halfway through the first frame, again rapping a rebound by Ward from close range after coming right off the bench and steaming into the Hurricanes' zone right to the net.

The Carolina comeback pattern repeated when Jussi Jokinen scored his 4th of the playoffs 30 seconds later after Fleury carelessly left a loose puck lying in front of him, then took a 3-2 lead on a weak knuckleball shot from the point by Hurricanes' defenseman Dennis Seidenberg goal after a bad giveaway by defenseman Kris Letang.

Fleury would surely like to have that one back.

That lead held up for the Canes into the intermission, but the Penguins really started to turn things on in the second period.

Max Talbot got the tying marker about 3 and 1/2 minutes in, taking a nice chip pass from Malkin off the wall and steaming in the Carolina zone while the Hurricanes were caught in a line change but scrambling to try and cut him off at the pass.

To no avail.

Talbot skated in, calmly sized up Ward and buried a half-slapper past him from about 25 feet half way up on the short side to tie the score.

Ward clearly didn't play Talbot's shot that well, as he went down early and also was a bit out of position.

As the Penguins would go on to outshoot Carolina 16-6 in the 2nd period, all of a sudden a big hole in the ice in the Carolina end appeared.

Thanks to the piano that fell off the back of Kunitz, that is, when Kunitz spun out of the near boards towards the left circle and ripped a wrister by Ward short side high for his first goal in his last 20 or so games, and first in more than 30 playoff contests, with about 7 seconds left in the period to cascade the momentum to Pittsburgh headed into the intermission.

Kunitz had a great chance in a prime scoring area and, finally, didn't make a mistake. Ward looked like he was not on his angle well, but Kunitz still made a nice shot. It was great to see him finally get off the snide.

#14 also added 2 assists for the Penguins on the night, including the one on Crosby's goal, as I already mentioned.

True to form, the Hurricanes came back again, 2 and 1/2 minutes into the third period, and tied the score on a top-shelf wrister from 4th line winger Patrick Eaves from about 20 feet.

Then, it was the Geno show.

First, Malkin restored the Pens' lead a 5-4 a few minutes later, again whacking one -- this time, his own rebound -- by Ward from close range.

Then, minutes later, there was a faceoff in the Carolina end, and the Penguins called for their set play called simply, "The Geno".

Malkin pushed the puck past Hurricanes' center Matt Cullen off the draw, quickly darted around him and retrieved the puck in the corner before Seidenberg could get it. Malkin then sped behind the net with Seidenberg chasing and made it look like he was going to try and get off a forehand shot from about 10 feet to Ward's left after he spun towards the front of the goal.

Not so fast.

In one motion, Malkin spun counterclock-wise and roofed a backhander as he was skating backwards away from -- and not looking at -- the goal that got behind a stunned Ward top-shelf and lifted the roof of a crazy Mellon Arena crowd that rained hats down on the ice in celebration of the Pens' 6-4 lead and Malkin's first career playoff hat trick.

Unbelieveable.

See for yourself: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MLLHFRoVoKo

The wind was mostly out of Carolina's sails there, and after Fleury made a key stop on Eric Cole to preserve the Pens' 2-goal lead with about 4 minutes to go, the Hurricanes threw in the towel and started trying to make a statement with their physical play, which included a match penalty to Carolina 4th liner Ryan Bayda, who cross-checked Letang in the face, and several other scrums. Those mix-ups included, among other things, noted pacifist Miroslav Satan raining blows down on Canes' defenseman Tim Gleason.

Anytime Satan is out there working someone over, you know everyone is pitching in for the cause.

Tyler Kennedy added an empty netter for Pittsburgh on their 42nd shot of the game to seal the 7-4 victory and the Penguins' big 2-0 lead in this series heading back to Carolina and the RBC Center for game 3 Saturday night.

One other player that was really solid for the Pens' last night was Matt Cooke. He finished with 3 helpers and, I felt, was a strong player in the offensive and neutral zones for the Penguins.

Last night's win tied an NHL playoff record for Pittsburgh as their 6th post-season victory this year after being down in a game.

Here's a couple great articles about game 2:

http://sports.espn.go.com/nhl/playoffs/2009/news?columnist=burnside_scott&id=4197569

http://www.newsobserver.com/796/story/1537889.html

Carolina ended up being in over their head in this game. Their defensive play was terrible and their supposed "shutdown" goaltender Cam Ward didn't do any favors for his 2010 Canadian Olympic Team chances with a miserable performance while Canada GM Steve Yzerman was watching from the press box.

Ward certainly didn't get any help from his defensemen, but he should have been in better position on Talbot's goal, Kunitz's goal and even Malkin's HT goal. He is going down early and not nearly as sharp as we're used to seeing him. He had never lost a game 2 in his career before last night. The Penguins did a good job of getting a lot more chances on him, and he wasn't up to the challenge at all.

Overall, most of the game was sloppy, especially early, when the Penguins were not sharp around their goal either. The difference is that Pittsburgh has the horses to overcome that. Carolina, who hasn't gotten an impact performance from their only true impact player, Eric Staal, in this series thusfar, does not.

Perhaps most discouraging mentally for Carolina as they limp back to Raleigh, NC is the fact that the way game 2 went was the way they have been winning games most of the post-season.

The Hurricanes have shown a habit of getting down, but coming back. Carolina did that last night, too. But the Penguins took their punches and continued to counterpunch. In the end, the Hurricanes didn't end up with a last second victory like they usually do. Pittsburgh was just too strong.

Still, there's no doubt that Carolina will come out much better in game 3. They'll get a lot of energy from their fans and from being in their building. It's one of the loudest in the league and the Penguins are going to have to withstand the first 5 to 10 minutes in the next contest. To do that, they have to tighten up their defensive play and get another strong outing from Fleury -- epsecially early, as I mentioned -- like he gave them in game 1.

If Pittsburgh is able to be strong on the Hurricanes from the outset of game 3, they'll put themselves in a great position to take a commanding 3-0 lead in the series. If Carolina manages to get its game together and make the series 2-1 after Saturday night, we'll have a whole new ballgame.

The fulcrum is there to be pivoted. Who will do it?

With Sid and Geno, I like the Penguins' chances.

NOTE: I am going out of town for the holiday weekend, and may only have occasional internet access, so I may not be posting as much in the next few days, and when I do, it may be shorter. I apologize to my regular readers for the lack of attention, but will be back in the fold early next week, so please keep tuning in.

Let's Go Pens.