PITTSBURGH (93.7 The Fan) – Pens jumped out to a lead and answered two more times after the Islanders would come back to tie it. They would have no answer to an onslaught of three goals in 2:59 of the second period, losing the game to the Islanders 5-3 and the series 4-2.
Pens forward Jeff Carter flew up the ice for the first goal at 1:27 of the first. After the Isles tied it, Jake Guentzel gave the Pens the lead back at 11:12 of the first. Kyle Palmieri would score on a blast that Tristan Jarry didn’t see until late and its even after one.
Jason Zucker’s deflection of a Cody Ceci shot gave the Pens the lead back early in the second and then the Islanders took control and didn’t allow the Pens much of a chance to get back in it.
“You want to get the first goal against this team, especially in this building,” Carter said. “Unfortunately tonight it didn’t go our way. We had numerous chances. They came out hard in the second, they got one there and then we kind of got off our game a little bit. They were pushing and we got off our game a little bit.”
Tristan Jarry allowed five goals on 24 shots Wednesday night. The 26-year-old was easily the worst player in game one and made a huge mistake in double overtime of game five. Sullivan would not say if they discussed replacing him with Maxime Legace. You wonder if he would have if Casey DeSmith were healthy.
“You win games as a team,” Sullivan said. “You lose games as a team. It’s not any one position. It’s not any one person’s fault. Everybody is trying their best to be a part of the solution. We could all be better.”
Guentzel would score his first goal of the series, but was also a minus 4. Sidney Crosby and Bryan Rust were held without a point and were a minus 3 as Rust put two shots on goal and Crosby four. Sid did have a power play opportunity ring off the post.
“You look at the two overtime games that we lost,” Crosby said. “Being able to win one of those would have been huge. The last couple of games I thought we played really well. We made some big mistakes.”
“Tonight, I miss a guy on a couple of chances that end up in the back of our net. A play here or there was really the difference. I have to come up with that on either side of the puck.”
“We were playing some pretty good hockey coming in,” Carter said. “For the most part, I thought we played some pretty good hockey. We couldn’t capitalize on some of our chances throughout the series. Give them a lot of credit. They’ve done it for years. They play a very structured game. A very simple game and patient game. When they get opportunities. They capitalize on them, that’s how they win games. They played a heck of a series as well. It could have went either way.”
“I certainly think when we go back and look at that series. We had our chances to seal games and win games.”