After a short break for the NHL All-Star game, the Penguins were back in action on the road Friday and Saturday nights against the Dallas Stars and Phoenix Coyotes, respectively. Â
On Friday night, the Penguins rallied midway through the third period to tie it at 3 on Mark Recchi’s 2nd goal of the night. It was also Mark Recchi’s 500th career goal, the 38th player to reach that milestone in NHL history. This forced a 5-minute sudden death overtime and ultimately a shootout in which Pittsburgh tallied the win. This was a great fast-paced game. Mark Recchi scored 2 goals and Sidney Crosby picked up 2 assists.
On Saturday, the Penguins traveled over to Phoenix, AZ, to take on Wayne Gretzky’s Coyotes. This game started out with a quick goal by the Penguins just 24 seonds into the game, but remained close with the score tied at 2-2 halfway through the second period. Then the Penguins exploded for 5 unanswered goals in the last half of the game to win 7-2. The Penguins had 7 goals from 7 different players, and Sidney Crosby had a goal and three assists for 4 points. This made him the NHL #1 Star for the night and added a 10-point cushion to his league leading 78 points. His goal was a highlight reel goal (aren’t most of them?) in which he rocketed a backhand over the near side shoulder of the goalie as Crosby was falling down with his back to the goal. You will want to look for this one on the highlight reel by clicking HERE. Mark Recchi also picked up a goal and 3 assists as well, giving him 6 goals and 13 points in just his last 3 games…..an amazing feat by anyone, much less an older star like Recchi!Â
With the two wins this weekend, the Penguins have 54 points and have moved into second place in the Atlantic Division behind New Jersey (with 65 points). It also propelled them into 7th place in the Conference, which is important because only the top 8 teams in each Conference go into the playoffs. Interestingly, they are only 6 points out of the 4th place in the conference and have as many as 4 games in hand against those ahead of them. This bodes very well for the Penguins to make a serious bid for the Playoffs this year. If they do make the playoffs, as I suspect they will, they will be the team that nobody wants to play in the first round. The next gane is set for Tuesday night (30 Jan) against the Florida Panthers at home.