PITTSBURGH (93.7 The Fan) – On super-hero night at PPG Paints arena, once again it was the Islanders Brock Nelson and Anders Lee who jumped out of the phone booth with capes on and beat the Pens 4-3 in overtime.
Nelson scoring on a breakaway about a minute after Pens goalie Tristan Jarry stopped a Kyle Palmieri breakaway. It’s Nelson’s fifth goal this season against the Penguins, Lee had his fifth and sixth goals against the Pens just this season. Lee tied it up as the Islanders had an extra attacker scoring in front of the net with 1:15 to play.
“It’s tough to swallow,” said Pens head coach Mike Sullivan. “It stings. I feel bad for the players because I felt for a majority of the night we were the better team. We had some momentary lapses in the third and they get back in the game.”
“They played a full 65 (minutes),” Jarry said. “We were able to push the first and second period and I think just a little bit of puck management in the third period. Obviously, there’s a couple of bounces that went their way.”
“We played a good game today,” said Pens forward Rickard Rakell. “We played the way we wanted to play, just a couple of instances where they score an important goal that we need to find a way to stop. It’s frustrating, we definitely outplayed them in the last few games, but we haven’t gotten the result.”
“I think we deserve better in some of the games we played against them,” said Pens defenseman Jeff Petry. “I think for a majority of the game we dictated the pace and controlled the play. A couple of things they were able to capitalize and in overtime, a couple of breakaways.”
“If we play games like we did tonight down the stretch we are going to win a lot of games if we play that way consistently.”
It's the Pens 10th overtime loss of the season, ninth loss when leading after two periods and the Islanders have now outscored the Pens 8-0 in the third period combined in the four matchups, all New York wins.
Jeff Carter played the puck with a high stick which negated an opportunity for an empty net goal that would have made it 4-2 before Lee tied it. Carter was not available for questions after the game.
“We are trying,” Sullivan said. “We are trying to play the game that brought us success. We are trying to play on our toes. We are trying to play a calculated game. We don’t want to give them any easy offense, but we are still trying to score. I think that’s an important aspect of learning how to play with leads and handle leads and work to get the next goal. You have to do it the right way.”
Pens scoring
A couple of deflections led to Pens goals. The first a Marcus Pettersson shot re-directed by Jake Guentzel after Kris Letang won a battle to get the puck to tie the game at 1 after Lee opened the scoring with his fifth goal of the season against the Pens on the power play.
Josh Archibald would also tip a puck, but with his hand, about shoulder high off a Brian Dumoulin shot to beat Ilya Sorokin. Jason Zucker had the other Pens goal off a pretty feed from Evgeni Malkin, his 22nd of the season and fifth in the last six games and ninth in the last 11.
Penalty king
An interference call 4:44 into the game made Malkin the Penguins all-time leader in penalty minutes with 1,050 in 1,045 games. That’s tied for 354th place on the NHL’s all-time list, tied with Todd Fedoruk. It’s Malkin’s 482nd penalty. He’s two penalties from tying now Rangers coach Gerard Gallant, although he reached 484 in just 615 games.
100 points
The primary assist on Guentzel’s goal was Pettersson’s 100th career point, 90th with the Pens which is tied with Alex Goligoski for 27th on the Pens all-time list for defensemen.
Wild Card standings
Islanders-67 games-76 points
Pens-64 games-74 points
Florida-65 games-70 points
Washington 66 games-69 points
Ottawa-63 games-68 points
Up Next
Pens host the Flyers Saturday at 3:30p.