Evgeni Malkin had two goals and an assist while His Sidness added a goal and three assists of his own as the Penguins beat the Minnesota Wild 4-2. Dany Sabourin played a strong game in goal as he earned the start after a poor performance from Marc Andre Fleury in the Pens last game.

Malkin opened the scoring at 3:30 of the second with a wrap-around from Sid and Ryan Malone. Three minutes later, Stephane Veilleux tied the game. But just fifteen seconds later Malkin scored again to put the Penguins ahead 2-1.

Brian Rolston tied the game up at 6:26 of the third as he jammed a puck past Sabourin.

However on the power play, Petr Sykora struck. Taking a puck in the slot, dancing around to get it on his forehand, he blasted the puck past Harding to put the Penguins ahead for good 3-2. Sidney Crosby scored on a break out, taking a pass from Sergei Gonchar to put the final nail in the coffin and give the Pens the 4-2 win.

Sabourin faced 30 shots in the game and honestly earned another start while Fleury gets his head screwed on straight. The win moved the Penguins to 6-4-1 (13 pts) and up to 5th place in the East.

Tomorrow night, the Penguins take on their next Western Conference foe – the Colorado Avalanche (7-4-0).

With four points against the Wild, His Sidness has 17 pts on the season (5G, 17A) and Malkin’s three points brings his season total to 16 (5G, 11A). Petr Sykora leads the team with six (6) goals.

The Penguins defense didn’t give Fleury much help for the first twenty one minutes of Saturday’s game against the Canadians. After failing to stop Montreal from basically having their way in the Pittsburgh zone and allowing 15 shots to find their way on net Fleury was benched after allowing three goals.

The wake-up call was not just to Fleury, who has struggled this year, but to the entire team who miraculously started to play defense for Dany Sabourin and allowing just 11 shots for the remaining 39 minutes and change of regulation.

After goals for Montreal from Dandenault, Markov and Ryder the Penguins methodically came back with goals from Sykora (PP), Crosby, and then Whitney who added the tying goal with just under two minutes to play with the Pens on the power play AND an empty net for the extra attacker. The last was a risky move since the short handed Canadiens didn’t have to worry about icing the puck and could have taken long shots on net if they ever gained possession. But thankfully it paid off.

Dany Sabourin played well, gobbling up rebounds and stopping the few shots he faced drawing chants of “Dany” from the crowd who at times appeared ready to throw Fleury under the bus (again, despite the poor defensive effort the Pens gave him).
The overtime period was pretty much uneventful.

The shootout saw Dany Sabourin and Carey Price for Montreal face eight shooters each. Of the Penguins shooters several seemed to have trouble even finding the net as Therrien used both Gonchar and Whitney who are both better known for their slap shots than their one on one, in close prowess before other shooters. Erik Christensen, Petr Sykora, Jarkko Ruutu, Ryan Whitney and Mark Recchi all missed the net with what could have been the goal that ended the contest as Sabourin stopped shot after shot until Andrei Markov finally beat him.

It was a pathetic ending to an otherwise superb comeback. Despite salvaging a point, the Penguins will have to find ways to win these games and at least get shots on goal during the shootouts IF they want to have a chance of winning.

The point did however move the Penguins (11pts) into second place in the Atlantic Division behind the surprising Flyers (14 pts). The Penguins take the ice again tomorrow night against the 7-2-2 Minnesota Wild.

It only took a single power play goal by Evgeni Malkin (3) at the start of the second period for the Penguins to get past the struggling New York Rangers who, once again, seem to have the worst team money can buy. Despite investing some $80 million in the off-season, the Rangers are an anemic 2-5-1 and having a hard time tickling the twine.

For the second four days the Penguins battled in a low scoring, but none the less exciting, contest full of big hits, exciting chances and superb goal tending. And for the second time in two games, Marc Andre Fleury gave fans hope that his early season struggles were just and anomaly.

Fleury turned away all 36 shots he faced and had a little help from his friends the posts as well. Lundqvist also shined stopping several good chances by the Penguins that could have sealed the game despite only managing 22 shots.

A point of concern however was evident. The Penguins got nailed with another too many men on the ice penalty late in the game that gave the Rangers a needless power play and excellent chance to tie the game. It seems they still need to work on their changes which were also a problem last year and caused so many problems.

The Penguins (5-3) are home again on Thursday to face the Toronto Maple Leafs for the second time this season. The Penguins won their previous encounter this season with the Leafs 6-4 on October 13th.

How exciting can a low scoring game be? The answer is pretty darn exciting!

With His Sidness, Geno and a host of other talented Penguins on the ice (not to mention Washington’s Alex Ovechkin as well) the game featured more than it’s share of up and down action and even a 3 on 1 break for each team in the second while they had problems changing while defending the goals furthest from their respective benches.

With Fleury back in net after getting a game to sit down and watch Sabourin play, the number one net minder responded with his best performance of the year so far as he stoned the Capitals and got some help from Lady Luck as well. Despite allowing a first period goal from Brian Pothier that put the Pens down by a goal, Fleury turned aside 30 of 31 shots while getting scoring from Jordan Staal (his first) and Ryan Witney (power play) in the second to take a 2-1 lead they would not relinquish.

Despite a couple missed opportunities by the Caps and pucks that just barely missed the net, Fleury looked to have regained some of his shine for a game.

The victory put the Penguins (4-3) over .500 for the first time this season.

Then Penguins managed an anemic 22 shots but made the most of them and continue to be improved in the face-off department splitting chances evenly with the Caps (26-26).

The Penguins return home to host the New York Rangers (2-4) and Jaromir Jagr Tuesday night (7:00 puck drop) at the Arena.

Apparently the Penguins found a way to win, and it looks a lot like how they started to win last season – in the shootout.

With Fleury ridding the bench after several poor performances, Dany Sabourin found himself between the pipes.  Despite giving up a powerplay goal less than a minute into the contest, Sabourin was as solid as you could hope for a backup netminder to be.  Sabourin stopped 29 shots in regulation and another 3 in OT after the Penguins stormed back from a 3-1 deficite late in the second to tie the game on goals from Hall (1) and Sykora (4).

The goal by Sykora was his second of the night while the Pens were on a two-man advantage after getting the Hurricanes to take a pair of sloppy penalties.

After neither team scored in OT, the shootout began.  Carolina goalie Cam Ward was beat by all three Penguins to take shots (Christensen, Sykora and Crosby) while Carolina managed to score on their first two shots from Matt Cullen and Jeff Hamilton but Sabourin found his glove hand and robbed Ray Whitney of the goal Carolina needed to match the feat of the Penguins scorers.

But now the question after last night’s game is is there a goal tender controversy?  Nah … not in Pittsburgh.

After evening their record at 3-3 the Penguins play back to back games this weekend, traveling to Washington to take on the Capitals tonight.

As the 2-2 Penguins host the 2-3 New Jersey Devils tonight at the Arena, Penguins fans will be looking for another strong performance reminiscent of how they played in Toronto rather than a lack luster display like had been seen in their first three games.