Before this Eastern Conference Quarterfinal between the Pittsburgh Penguins and Ottawa Senators resumed at Ottawa's Scotiabank Place last night with the Penguins up 2-1 in the series, Sens' Head Coach Cory Clouston was asked about the uneven performance of his rookie goaltender, Brian Elliott, in the first three games up to that point.
"I don't think we're good enough to have just average goaltending," Clouston said.
After the Penguins scorched the Senators for 7 goals in a 7-4 victory in game 4, it's plain that they aren't good enough with below average goaltending, either.
Pittsburgh chased Elliott to the bench after he allowed 4 goals in 20 or so shots in about only 25 minutes of work, then almost as violently abused the relief man, Pascal LeClaire, for 3 goals the rest of the way.
In fairness to Ottawa, bad goaltending wasn't their only issue last night.
Ghastly turnovers and inexcusable penalties were almost as responsible for their defeat as the play of their netminders.
Look no further than their two 'too-many-men-on-the-ice' penalties last night.
That's three in the series so far. And that comes after 13 of those during the regular season.
"We got nobody to look at but ourselves," Senators' defenseman Chris Phillips said afterwards.
Things started innocuously enough in the game, with the Pens' leading 1-0 after one period on an Evgeni Malkin power play goal, his fourth of the series.
In the 2nd period, the onslaught began.
Just a few minutes into the frame, with the Senators pressing, Ottawa center Jason Speeza made a nice play to win possession of the puck behind the Penguins net then skated into the corner and a little bit up the boards towards the point looking to make a play.
For some reason, he thought he had a point man to give the puck to, but when he tried that, Pens' blueliner Sergei Gonchar -- covering him from behind -- swiped the biscuit and was quickly joined by Chris Kunitz and Sidney Crosby in stride on an odd-man rush.
Sarge pushed the puck up to Kunitz who fought off Senators' defenseman Anton Volchenkov at the Ottawa blue line and just nudged the puck ahead to Crosby who picked it up in full flight between the circles and quickly whipped a wrist shot past Elliot for a 2-0 lead.
I hope you didn't go to the bathroom at this point, folks.
After the ensuing faceoff, the puck was dumped into the Ottawa zone. Elliott went behind his net to do what he doesn't do all that well --- play the puck.
Sure enough, Elliott tossed it right to Talbot in the near corner. Mad Max looked up, found a streaking Matt Cooke in the slot, and he beat Elliott to the far side with a wrister to make it 3-0 only 12 seconds after Crosby's goal.
When the Pens' Captain scored on a wrist shot to the far side from the right circle on a 1-on-1 rush just a few minutes later to make the score 4-0, Clouston had seen enough of Elliott.
The game did get a little interesting at that point, as Chris Neil scored to make it 4-1. Unfortunately, he helped kill any momentum his goal might have generated when he punched Pens' blueliner Kris Letang in the back and knocked him down in the course of the goal celebration, leaving the Sens shorthanded for the next two minutes.
While they killed that penalty and Ottawa Captain Daniel Alfredsson got on the board for the first time in this series with a nice slapshot tally from the left circle a few minutes later, Ottawa couldn't help but continue stumbling all over itself.
After the Penguins took another penalty and gave the Senators a chance to get right back in the game, they allowed a shorthanded goal to Pens' center Max Talbot, who finished a beautiful cross-crease diagonal pass from fellow penalty killer Craig Adams by chipping the puck over LeClaire's shoulder for a 5-2 lead.
Less than a minute later, though, after another Penguin penalty and a 2-man advantage, Ottawa forward Matt Cullen easily scored on a cross-ice one-timer that Pens' netminder Marc-Andre Fleury was helpless to stop.
Again within 2 goals, Crosby killed the Senators' momentum when he made a beautiful play to tap a rebound back to linemate Chris Kunitz while drawing close attention near the Senators' net by not one, but TWO Ottawa players.
Kunitz took advantage easily and beat LeClaire on the glove side to make it 6-3 and end a wild second period that saw 8 goals between the teams.
After another two-man advantage goal for Ottawa to make it 6-4 about 7 minutes into the 3rd period, Pens' third-line center Jordan Staal -- fresh off his Selke Trophy nomination -- scored on the power play by chipping a rebound up over LeClaire and off the crossbar and in to make it 7-4.
When that settled to be the final score, all the Senators were left with were questions.
For one, which goaltender do they go with in game 5 back at Mellon Arena on Thursday night.
For another, how can they contain Sidney Crosby?
There are no easy answers to either for Ottawa.
Both Elliott and LeClaire look overmatched, and Crosby is having one of the best series' of his young career.
After his two goals and two assists last night, he has 11 points in 4 games.
At that pace, Crosby would shatter the NHL playoff record for most points in a single post-season.
The Senators were supposed to have the answer for him, with their supposed 'shutdown' pairing of defensemen Chris Phillips and Anton Volchenkov, but all the Pens' Captain has done is dominate.
Crosby has hit another gear right now -- there's no question about it. And everyone knows it. To wit:
http://slam.canoe.ca/Slam/Hockey/NHL/Playoffs/Pittsburgh/2010/04/20/13660071.html
Ottawa fans will probably gripe about the officiating last night and, to some degree, rightfully so. The zebras were terrible last night. They failed to call a pretty obvious slashing call on Pittsburgh early in the game, then didn't call and even more obvious delay of game penalty in the 3rd period with the Pens' on the power play when Kunitz accidentally shot the puck into the netting behind the Pens' goal.
On the other side of the ledger, the Penguins weren't dolled out any favors from the officials either. Two extended 5-on-3's against is a tough pill for anyone to swallow. Those are just about gimme goals and the fact that those situations were the result of some pretty ticky-tack calls makes them even tougher to take.
The reality, however, is that the officiating didn't decide the game.
The Penguins simply overwhelmed the Senators last night, and with the Pens only needing one more win to seal this series, Ottawa can see things slipping away:
http://www.ottawacitizen.com/sports/hockey/ottawa-senators/Slip+slip+slipping+away/2931269/story.html
"We're working. We're trying," Spezza said.
And even with too-many-men, they can't keep up.
More later.
NOTES:
Pens' RW Tyler Kennedy left the game in the 3rd period with what appeared to be a lower body injury after a check on the near boards from hulking Sens' defenseman Andy Sutton and did not return. There's no word at this point on the scope or severity of TK's injury.
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