Defenseman Jordan Leopold has been a fairly steady acquisition for the Pittsburgh Penguins since GM Ray Shero added him to the blueline from the Florida Panthers for a 2nd round pick prior to this year's March 3 trade deadline.
In 15 games since joining the Flightless Birds, Leopold had put up 4 assists and a +4 rating prior to Wednesday's game against the Tampa Bay Lightning.
However, despite having 7 goals on the year before coming to Pittsburgh, Leopold hadn't hit the back of the net for his new club during that stretch.
Fortunately, that all changed at the most opportune moment last night.
Almost 3 minutes into overtime against the Atlanta Thrashers, Leopold innocently carried the puck down the near wall into the Thrashers' zone by himself while his teammates went for a line change.
Leopold looked like he was going to carry the puck deep along the boards, but curled up short. Still not a threat because he had no help -- and with an Atlanta player sticking with him relatively closely -- Leopold just quickly tossed the puck on the net.
Once again showing that putting the puck on the goal is never a bad play, the biscuit squirted through the legs of surprised Thrasher (and former Penguin) netminder Johan "The Moose" Hedberg for the game winner as the Pens' overcame a late 3-2 deficit to come back and get the 2 points on the strength of a 4-3 OT win.
With his team fighting for a playoff berth and their season arguably on the line, Hedberg had played really well for Atlanta up until that point in the game, stoning several Penguin players throughout the contest on good scoring chances. When it mattered the most, though, he got caught sleeping a bit and kept his team from getting another point that could make the difference as to whether the Thrashers get in the post-season dance or not.
The Penguins looked like they wanted to give Atlanta a real good head start on that effort just minutes into the contest when -- for the 9th time in the last 11 games, and the last 7 straight -- they gave up the first goal.
Thrashers' forwards Niklas Bergfors and Maxim Afinogenov broke into the Pittsburgh zone about 3 minutes into the game on what essentially was a 2-on-4 rush. It seemed that the Pens had the play covered, but then defenseman Kris Letang let his guard down when he watched Afinogenov pass the puck to Berfors and then stopped skating on the play. That allowed the sneaky russian to get behind Letang, take the return pass, and easily deposited it behind a helpless Marc-Andre Fleury for a 1-zip Atlanta edge.
Evgeni Malkin -- playing his first game in 7 contests after missing time with a right foot injury -- tied the score in the 2nd period on a power play when he finished off a nice tic-tac-toe passing play after dishes by Sidney Crosby and Alex Goligoski and then blistering one by an out-of-position Hedberg from low in the right circle.
Later in the 2nd, the Thrashers got about 4 consecutive minutes of power play time of their own and took advantage when the well-known Tim Stapleton deflected an Atlanta point shot past Fleury for just his 2nd goal of the year 2 seconds before the second penalty was to expire.
RW Tyler Kennedy again tied the score for Pittsburgh about 3 minutes into the 3rd period when he capitalized on a rebound and blew it by Hedberg from the left circle, but that lead didn't last long enough for anyone to make a trip to the restroom without missing anything.
After winning a faceoff in their OWN zone, the Penguins got careless with their puck management, gave it away, and Atlanta forward Rich Peverly made them pay by picking up an uncontested rebound before beating Fleury to restore the Thrashers' 1-goal lead.
That lead looked like it was going to hold and careen the Boys of Winter to another disappointing home ice defeat, until Atlanta forward Jim Slater had a mental meltdown by taking a ridiculous offensive zone holding penalty with just over 2 minutes to go in the game.
This time, when the Pens' power play needed to come through for them, it did.
After Head Coach Dan Bylsma pulled Fleury, Malkin steamed into the Atlanta end with the puck on the far boards, then passed the puck to an onrushing Gonchar at the center point who lashed a seeing-eye shot past a beleaguered Hedberg with 75 seconds in the game to tie the score.
I'll tell you -- some observers feel that Sarge's shot has lost a little bit of velocity the last season or two, but if that's true, it wasn't evident on that play, because #55 got ALL of it. And that's the type of play that the Penguins will miss if Gonchar leaves this season as a free agent, because neither Letang or Goligoski are threats like that.
Incredible.
Of course, Gonchar's goal just set the stage for Leopold's heroics, which allowed the Penguins to at least keep pace with the New Jersey Devils in the Atlantic Division standings because the Devils also won last night, over Carolina, 4-0.
With both clubs having the exact same record and each team having 4 games left to play -- and playing on the same night from here on until the end of the season 8 days from now -- the Devils are technically ahead of the Penguins in the standings on the strength of that 6-0 head-to-head season sweep.
On the bright side, the Buffalo Sabres, also battling for seeding with New Jersey and Pittsburgh, were shutout by the Montreal Canadiens last night.
Coincidentally, the Sabres and Devils play each other on the final day of the year in what may shape up as a very relevant game for seeding in the East.
The Penguins are off until Tuesday when they continue their home stand by welcoming their other regular season nemises, the Washington Capitals, to Mellon Arena.
Somehow, even though he hasn't been scoring many goals lately, Sidney Crosby still remains in the lead for the Rocket Richard trophy for the most tallies in the league this season.
Crosby has 47, one up on Steven Stamkos of the Lightning and Alexander Ovechkin of the Caps.
Incredibly, Ovechkin has only scored 4 goals since February 1.
More on Monday, when I'll have an interesting take on the question of seeding for the Penguins come post-season time.
Happy Easter everyone.
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