The Pittsburgh Penguins fell short once again this year, but this one hurt more than some of the past ones. After leading the New York Rangers 3-1 and heading back to Pittsburgh and the Consol Energy Center for a chance to clinch, the Penguins lost three straight and lost a chance at reaching the Eastern Conference Finals for the second straight year. It’s the second time the team has blown a 3-1 series lead in the last four postseasons and they’ve lost to a lower-seeded opponent for five consecutive years since winning the Cup in 2009.
My roommate Jon sent me links to two different articles, one by Sean Conboy of pittsburghmagazine.com and an article by the Pittsburgh Tribune saying that the firing of Bylsma is probable according to inside sources.
The article I want to talk about is Mr. Conboy’s. Now if you read through his article, he mentions some pretty good points and in my opinion, those points alone make it worth reading, but other things he says are preposterous and just stupid. I kid you not, Conboy says, word-for-word, “This team wanted to go home.”
Are you kidding me?! He throws some stats out there, mentioning how many shots the Rangers blocked compared to the Penguins.
Did the Pens play the best hockey they could play? No, I’ve seen them play better, but if you watched Tuesday’s game, something I don’t believe Mr. Conboy did, you would know that had the Pens been playing someone aside from the New York Rangers, chances are they would have scored at least three goals (and that’s including if that team blocked just as many shots as the Rangers did on Tuesday) which would have given the Pens a 3-2 win.
There is one main reason why the Pens lost and it’s not because the death of Martin St. Louis’ mother pumped up the New York Rangers to such a level that they became an All-Star team. It felt like every five minutes NBC was throwing that down my throat. I’m not trying to be insensitive. I feel sorry for St. Louis but enough is enough. Every time a goal was scored, they had to somehow attribute it to St. Louis’ mother. Every shot he took or pass he made was suddenly worthy of an instant replay and immediate analysis. It was ridiculous. The NBC broadcasting crew should have just come to work in full Rangers garb because it would have been less irritating and underhanded then the broadcasting I had to listen to.
It’s not because the Pens’ defense was terrible, although that certainly paid a large contribution. The Pens might have only allowed 20 shots on net but the Rangers had plenty of scoring chances off of those shots because of poor defense. Watch the game 7 recap and you’ll see quite easily that the great Matt Niskanen, who had one of the best defensive seasons in the league this year, leading the league in plus-minus, made one of the most basic mistakes in the game of hockey. Rather than take notice that the Rangers were on a 4-on-2, Niskanen decided to charge puckhandler Derek Dorsett, leaving rookie Olli Maatta all alone on a 3-on-1, an easy goal-scoring situation for any team, which the Rangers capitalized on. Then, on a Rangers powerplay, the Pens frontmen, Brian Gibbons and Brandon Sutter, went on the offensive on the penalty kill, which gave the Rangers the chance at the fast break. If you watch the play, you’ll see the Pens spin around looking for the puck while the Rangers barrage Fleury until the puck hits the twine. They’re two plays that took only a few seconds but it only takes one second to score a goal.
However, that’s not the main reason the Pens lost. Only two words are needed to fill in that blank: Henrik Lundqvist.
Henrik Lundqvist is always in the upper echelon of the league’s netminders and in my opinion has already secured a spot in Toronto. He has set nearly every goaltending record for the Rangers and is a finalist for the Vezina Trophy practically every year.
I hate the Rangers with a burning passion. I hate every one of the guys that suits up for the team except for Henrik Lundqvist because he is an athlete that deserves respect. He does not quit or give up, he excels, he’s consistent and he’s a humble guy. So even though I was seething in anger watching Lundqvist make save after save after ridiculous save against the Penguins, I knew I was witnessing something special.
If you read Mr. Conboy’s piece, he will tell you to “go back and watch all five New York Rangers form a human shield in front of Henrik Lundqvist for the entirety of Game 7.”
The Rangers have always been a shot-blocking team, so for Conboy to act like this is a never-before-seen phenomenon is simply unreasonable. Perhaps Conboy forgot about the 36 shots that “shield” didn’t block.
If you watch those 36 shots head to the net and 35 of them be stopped by a desperate, flopping Lundqvist, you’ll notice there was nothing second-rate about the Penguins offense in that game. It wasn’t the type of perfection we usually see from them, but it was still impressive. No matter what they did, they could not get that rubber across that goal line again. It felt like I was watching the great Patrick Roy in game 3 of the 1986 Eastern Conference Finals, one of the greatest goaltending performances in NHL history.
This is for sure: change is on it’s way to Pittsburgh this offseason. The other thing for sure? The Montreal Canadiens will have my full support as they try to beat the Rangers.
wordsofwistim 