Pregame
The Penguins enter Game 3 with some adjusted forward lines, left wings shuffled all around the first three lines from the start of last game. Otherwise it’s the same, including Stuart Skinner back in net.
The Flyers are sticking with what’s been working to this point by using the same players and combos.
First period
It’s a good start for the Penguins, the road venue doesn’t make any impact. Pittsburgh gets the first few shots and then the first power play when Sean Couturier trips up Sam Girard. Lo and behold, they score a goal on that power play, the first of the series, to take their first lead in a game. Sidney Crosby passes to Bryan Rust, who quickly feeds Evgeni Malkin at the other side of the crease. Malkin knocks it home, 1-0 Pens.
Late in the period, before a faceoff Garnet Hathaway flung his stick up behind his back and it went inside the visor of Crosby, who fell to the ice. Crosby stayed down a minute after it. The refs send both players off the ice, feeling Crosby milked it a little too much once the crowd and Hathaway threw a fit over it. Maybe he shouldn’t have been swinging his stick around the eyeball of a Mount Rushmore player?
First period ends with the shots 11-11, which is much more the type and style of game that the Penguins want to play compared to the quagmire that those early games of getting very few shots in the first. Pittsburgh up on the board 1-zippy.
Second period
The ref show continues in the second period, Travis Konecny hits Kris Letang after a whistle, Letang joins Konecny in the penalty box after a halfhearted response. Then on the ensuing 4v4, Erik Karlsson gets rung up on a tripping infraction that didn’t create or deny a scoring chance or change possession of the puck. Philadelphia gets a long 4v3 power play. Skinner stops Porter Martone in front of the net on the best scoring chance they get.
As soon as Konecny gets out of the box he’s right back on his BS giving Rust an elbow to the head. This sends Rust off the deep end as they scrap after the whistle. Somehow out of the scrum all 10 skaters on the ice end up in the penalty box for roughing and Rust picks up an extra minor for…unknown reasons.
The delays to sort it out take so long that Crosby and Malkin leave the bench to stretch their legs and warm up, complete loss of control by the refs.
Finally play resumes with a Philadelphia 5v4 power play, and they get their first PPG when Trevor Zegras hammers a one-timer by Skinner. 1-1 game.
The Flyers can’t stop Flyering, Nick Seelers throws three crosschecks at Crosby away from the puck and the PEns get a power play out of it. With Rust and Karlsson still in the box, it doesn’t get much going.
That builds momentum for the Flyers, they get a long shift in the period and send some shots in that Skinner can’t smother or corral and the defense can’t clear. Philadelphia hits the post and it looks like the Pens are on the ropes. They are, Rasmus Ristolainen sneaks a long-range low shot by Skinner. 2-1 Philadelphia gets their first lead of the night.
The Penguins have three shots in the period and the Flyers score their third goal of the period. Connor Clifton chips a puck back to the Flyers and they get it back high and go around the horn. Seeler throws a long range shot on, there’s a bit of traffic but Skinner can’t nab it with the glove. 3-1 game.
The Penguins get a golden chance when Ristolainen breaks his stick and is trapped. Rust walks around him but Dan Vladar stops the shot and the follow-up can’t get there in time.
Period ends, what a doozy it was. Shots are 15-7 Philadelphia. Goals were 3-0 in the second. The Penguins have to be wondering what the hell just happened, I know I’m doing the same.
Third period
Egor Chinakhov’s hard wrister knocks the skate blade off Vladar’s skate. The refs give him a whistle, they shouldn’t have.
A few minutes later, the Penguins get a power play, Tyson Foerster is off for tripping Ben Kindel. Rust drives the net and falls on Vladar’s arm to get a whistle and that’s as close as the Penguins get.
Soon after, a gift when Matvei Michkov getting too aggro after a whistle. This time, it strikes. Erik Karlsson booms a slapper by the blocker side of Vladar. 3-2 game with 10:21 to go.
Anthony Mantha has one he wants back, flipping the puck over the glass for a penalty. Skinner makes his first stop of the period and it’s a big one on a Noah Cates breakaway. Cates gets his revenge, slipping behind Ryan Shea and bringing the puck forehand down low. 4-2 with 7:30 to go.
The Pens get another power play with 6:32 to go, they take their timeout to gear up, nothing happening this time.
It gets down to desperation time, Skinner pulled for the extra attacker with about 3 minutes to play. Doesn’t work, Owen Tippett sinks the empty net goal with 1:12.
Some thoughts
- For matchup watch: the Pens started the Crosby line at the beginning of the first and third periods (their was a power play at the start of the second). They surely knew what that would bring with the Flyers getting last change and using the Couturier line out there to meet them.
- It always funny (but sometimes not ‘ha-ha’ funny) to watch a power play oscillate between atrocious and glorious for no reason. Everyone’s a critic (which, hey, here too) about changing personnel or changing strategy, do this, do that. The Pens dismiss all that, score on a tic-tac-toe fancy passing play that ends with a backside tap in from the same guys they wanted. They’re always going to do it their way, because it’s what they know and what they’re best at. (But that play was setup by good wall work by Rakell and Rust plus the benefit of a Flyer breaking his stick and skating off the ice for some reason. They still did need to perform better before getting to the fun stuff).
- However, it did look like there were some adjustments made at 5v5, before we get to the part where, you know, it all goes to hell. Pittsburgh put bodies to the net and then got the puck there, battling through as they went. After only recording seven total SOG in the first and second games combined, the Pens put up 10 alone in the first period of this game.
- They also schemed up a way to generate more speed through the neutral zone to bump or drop passes back and hit a player with speed to break through the layers of the Flyers’ defensive structure. Now we’ll see if Philadelphia has an adjustment for the adjustment. Nice to see the Pens’ coaches be able to install something useful that helped unlock the middle of the ice, even though ultimately they still ended up with a big goose egg with 0 5v5 goals for the third straight game.
- The second period was infuriating and all those shrewd adjustments and best laid plans unraveled and went completely down the drain. Didn’t help to have Konecny go unpunished (and at times rewarded) for stirring the pot post-whistle by targeting opponent’s heads, but the Pens got pushed way away from where they wanted to be and were finding success. It’s 2012 all over again with the game unraveling. Wasn’t fun then, isn’t fun now!
- Unravel is the word for Skinner too, which is a shame. He was so good in the early going. You could see his play and form slipping away, a puck hit his glove and he couldn’t keep close it up. Rebounds were starting to be placed in areas his team couldn’t get to them. A few seconds before the Zegras PPG, the puck rolled into Skinner’s stomach, he couldn’t stop it from rolling off it. Then the shot off the post seemed to put him on tilt, giving up a bad goal to Ristolainen seconds later to a shot he saw the whole way. Two game minutes later, another bad goal against from Seeler. Went it goes south for Skinner, it goes all the way there and very quickly. Turned out to be at the absolute worst moment, which again is a tough development since he was really good early in this game and serviceable enough up until the point where the bottom drops out.
- Will Rust losing his mind be the moment that we think back of all summer and maybe beyond? He fell for the bait. Hook, line and sinker. Handed the Flyers a power play when the Penguins were up 1-0 and doing just fine. It was all downhill from there. Personally, I find it hard to criticize someone for responding and sticking up for themselves when getting elbowed in the head but the Pens always talk about how they need to be smart, walk away, let it go. Then they just never do, and the problem with rolling around with pigs is that you end up covered in the muck and the pig likes it.
- Two power play goals aside for each team, two weak ones for Philadelphia were the difference. The Penguins going from 201 5v5 goals (2nd most in NHL) to now 0 5v5 goals in three games is the story of the series. (Pittsburgh’s lone even strength goal, in Game 1 by Rust, came with the goalie pulled).
- There’s disappointments about as far as the eye can reach, doesn’t help that 2024 playoff Anthony Mantha showed up. The one who got scratched by Vegas. Pittsburgh was within reach at 3-2 with time left and looking somewhat stable for a comeback effort. Mantha’s careless play of the puck and the subsequent PHI PPG to extend the lead to 4-2 put the game practically out of reach
Well, that’s that. The Penguins fall into a 3-0 series hole without much hope at this point. Their even strength offense has been nonexistent. Their goaltending has shown signs of cracks to where it’s not going to be anything to lean on. They play into their opponent’s hands by lacking discipline. All of this paragraph applied in 2012 and it now looks practically the same 14 years later. They get one more chance on Saturday in Game 4 to earn another one after that.
