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Fleury Leads Pens Past Columbus In 4-2 Victory, Teams Meet Again Tonight

November 2, 2013, 12:36 PM ET [58 Comments]
Ryan Wilson
Pittsburgh Penguins Blogger • RSSArchiveCONTACT
The Pittsburgh Penguins and Columbus Blue Jackets hit the ice last night in the first game of their home and home series this weekend. The Penguins were able to come out victorious in a 4-2 win.

Here are the game highlights:




The first period saw a Blue Jackets team that closely resembled the Penguin team that just went through a 3 game losing streak. The Jackets had a very good first period which saw them apply a lot of quality pressure, however that pressure was not fruitful in the goals department. Marc Andre Fleury was superb in period one (pretty much the entire game) and kept the Blue Jackets off the scoreboard. In the game Fleury stopped 37 out of a possible 39 shots. Fleury has earned a well deserved night off tonight.

Jeff Zatkoff will be getting the start for the Penguins in Columbus tonight.

On the flip side of the goalie coin Sergei Bobrovsky was not as sharp as he would have liked to be. Bobrovsky was pulled early in the 2nd period after giving up a less than desirable power play goal to Kris Letang. Bobrovsky usually has his share of success inside the CONSOL Energy Center, but it wasn’t the case on Friday night.

The Blue Jackets played a high energy and physical brand of hockey last night and if they are able to add some legitimate offensive threats to the lineup they will be in really good shape. The good news for them is that they do have a very good offensive player to add to the lineup, Nathan Horton. He will eventually make his Columbus debut once he heals from offseason shoulder surgery.







You can see from the chart that in the early goings of the game it was very competitive. Fleury rose to the occasion while the defending Vezina Trophy winning goalie had an off night. With the Penguins opening up a 4-0 lead score effects took over in the possession department.

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Some other positives to take away from the game last night include Malkin’s ability to string back to back dominate games together. Malkin was once again one of the best players on the ice. He had a jump in his step and had the puck on a string. Most importantly his compete level was top notch again and when that is the case he is causing turnovers and making plays off of them. He had some tangible rewards for his work last night as he collected 2 assists. He came close to scoring a goal off a one timer feed from Crosby but the post had other ideas.


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Megnatron continues to look like he belongs. Jayson Megna added another goal in last night’s game and he has continually made the right plays/decisions while on the ice. There have been many players to get rotated through Malkin’s line the past 2 years and Megna has done a better job in his small sample size than most of them.

Out of the players that are active right now for Pittsburgh I think there are only 6 players better than him amongst the forward ranks: Crosby, Kunitz, Dupuis, Malkin, Jokinen, and Sutter.

I think he has shown more than the other active forwards on the roster. That is good news for a young kid looking to stick in the lineup. Bad news if you are Matt D’Agostini or Chuck Kobasew.

Even Dr. Evil is in on the Megnatron bandwagon


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Brandon Sutter scored his second snap shot goal in as many games last night and is flashing some of his offensive talent. The biggest thing for Sutter if he is going to have offensive success this year will be for the Penguins to get healthy. Sutter has felt the Penguins injury bug at forward more than any other Penguins player. He consistently has players like Adams and Glass on his wing and that is not conducive to generating tons of offensive chances. That doesn’t mean that Glass and Adams aren’t having good years, that just means they are 4th line players who are playing outside of their intended roles.

When Bennett and Neal get back the Penguins will have a really decent third line with the potential to start making their presence felt on the scoresheet on a nightly basis. The addition of Megna has been a pleasant surprise and provides the Penguins with better forward depth than they had when the season started.


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One thing I noticed last night in the negative department was on the power play, specifically Kris Letang. I realize that Letang had a PP goal and that certainly doesn’t go unnoticed by me, but it’s the little things that he needs to get right. Probably the biggest reason I have been critical of his ability to quarterback and upper echelon power reared its head again last night.

There was a sequence last night where Letang was consistently making passes outside of his teammates comfort zone. What I mean by that is he kept putting passes on his teammate’s backhands, specifically to Malkin. It might not sound like a big deal but on the power play it is night and day how effective things can be if the passes are put in spots that are easiest to receive. Malkin cannot take his one timer bomb if he is always taking the puck on his backhand. The small amount of time it takes to corral the puck in also allows the PK unit to reset their lanes.

When Gonchar ran the PP one thing you could be sure of, the passes were going to be in his teammate’s wheelhouse all the time. Maybe it’s a small gripe but I don’t think it is asking too much from a guy of Letang’s skill set to fix.


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I don’t foresee any drastic roster changes for the Penguins in tonight’s game. The only major change should be Jeff Zatkoff replacing Marc Andre Fleury in net. Perhaps Matt D’Agostini will find his way back into the lineup but we won’t know until later this evening. The Penguins cancelled their morning skate so there will be no line combos to report today.

Blue Jackets coach Todd Richards has said that Curtis McElhinney will be getting the start in goal tonight for Columbus. Richards has also announced that Nikita Nikitin will be making his return to the lineup tonight for the first time since October 19. It remains to be seen who the healthy scratch will be for Columbus on defense.

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Patrick Kaleta has been put on waivers by the Buffalo Sabres. Your move Flyers?

Thanks for reading!
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