Penguins
No McMassacre, Determined Penguins Beat Oilers
The Pittsburgh Penguins had lost seven consecutive games to Edmonton before Thursday evening.
They had been outscored in those games, 37-9, and might have been outplayed even more than those numbers suggest.
And most of the time, Connor McDavid’s fingerprints were all over the Oilers’ victories.
After being held to three goals and seven assists in his first eight games against the Penguins, McDavid had piled up six goals and 11 assists during the Oilers’ 7-0 run.
But while the Penguins did not shut down McDavid Thursday — he picked up three assists — they did contain him enough to defeat Edmonton, 5-3, at PPG Paints Arena.
The victory raised their record to 18-17-8.
The second of Sidney Crosby’s two assists in the opening period moved him past Joe Sakic and into ninth place on NHL’s all-time points lead with 1,642.
Evgeni Malkin, the Penguins’ second-line center, missed his second game because of an unspecified upper-body injury. He worked out on the ice during and after the team’s optional game-day skate.
The Penguins took a 5-3 lead into the third period, and had to kill a roughing minor assessed to Michael Bunting at 11:04 to preserve that cushion.
The Penguins not only did not give up a goal on Edmonton’s first shot of the game — nine of their previous 42 opponents had done just that — but grabbed a 1-0 lead at 3:21 of the opening period, as Rickard Rakell punched a rebound past Oilers goalie Stuart Skinner from the left side of the crease.
Bryan Rust and Marcus Pettersson earned assists on the goal, Rakell’s 21st.
Rakell’s goal snapped Edmonton’s shutout streak against the Penguins at 130:58. It was their first against the Oilers since Malkin scored last March 3 at Rogers Place.
The Penguins’ top line struck again at 7:22, as Rakell screened Skinner and Rust beat him with a wrist shot from the top of the left circle for his 16th. Pettersson and Crosby got the assists.
Kevin Hayes kept the Pittsburgh Penguins’ rampage going at 9:46, throwing a shot past Skinner from below the hash marks after getting a feed from Drew O’Connor, who was below the goal line. Ex-Oilers forward Jesse Puljujarvi picked up the second assist on the goal, Hayes’ sixth.
Edmonton finally broke through at 12:33, but not until goalie Alex Nedeljkovic had made a sensational save on a Zach Hyman breakaway. Oilers forward Leon Draisaitl got to the rebound, however, and was able to shovel it past Nedeljkovic to cut the Penguins’ lead to 3-1 and become the first NHL player to record 30 goals this season.
The Penguins, so often guilty of having a letdown after scoring themselves in 2024-25, had the opposite reaction to Edmonton’s goal, as O’Connor countered Draisaitl’s goal by snapping in a shot from inside the left circle at 13:41 for his sixth.
Rust, who recorded the second three-point period of his career, and Crosby got assists.
The Penguins got the first power play of the game when Oilers winger Vasily Podkolzin was sent off for tripping at 5:01 of the second. Crosby took full advantage of it 41 seconds later, taking a feed from Michael Bunting and tossing in a shot from the bottom of the right circle for his 12th.
The second assist went to Erik Karlsson.
Edmonton got a chance with the extra man when Kris Letang was called for slashing at 6:07, but failed to beat Nedeljkovic.
Draisaitl, however, sliced the Penguins’ lead to 5-2 at 10:58, pulling in a cross-ice pass from McDavid and burying a puck behind Nedeljkovic from outside the right dot.
Rust was penalized for interfering with McDavid at 18:09, and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins got Edmonton within two at the second intermission by scoring from the slot at 19:15.
The Pittsburgh Penguins are scheduled to practice Friday at noon at UPMC Lemieux Sports Complex.
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The refs tried to give that game to the Oilers. Ned really stole the game! Every player was noticeable, the only one I’d swap out once Malkin returns
is Glass
Glass did Glass things. Good pressure in the O zone. Pretty solid puck management and possession. Zero chance he scores. Just no finish at all. It’s amazing really. Does so much well but just can’t score.
I will add that if it weren’t for the refs, would anyone have noticed that Kapanen was here tonight? Played 7:07 and was a minus one.
Good effort, leave Geno on injured reserve. If Sullivan would have played the kids earlier they would be a much better team. Hayes, Glass should have be somewhere besides here. And if Sullivan was a real coach Karlsson would have found his game earlier this year. I still think the Penguins dump and chase is a young players game, that’s why it only works with this older team when the legs are fresh.
Very fun game to watch!!! I’ll take that over any game this season.
Do the Oilers practice manufacturing bogus penalties?
They are like the Caps, always trying to get on the PP. the refs were bad.
Yup. The drill is called Oilers circles.
“Take the fall! Act hurt! Get indignant!”
🦆🦆🦆
You tell them Coach Bombay!
Pens dominated them early, poor officiating got the Oilers back in the game. Ned won a game I doubt Jarry wouldn’t have. Like the HOP line! Jesse needs to stay in the lineup. Funny the team doesn’t see to be hurting with Geno out.
Malkin is the 2nd line. We were playing with 1st, 3rd, 4th and 5th line. So, you’ve seen the game and Beauvillier, Glass and Bunting looked like a 2nd line to you? Have you seen Bunting other than on PP, when he scored? Could it be that he needs someone to play with? I don’t know, man. It looks like you’ll be going after Crosby next, after a couple of turnovers tonight, one of which, if I’m not mistaken, led to the first Edmonton goal.
P. S. You’re right, Jar-Jar would’ve lost the game.
I love Geno but he is shot. Look how I got down voted above. Geno really is no longer an average 2nd line center. He skates around like a ice skating dancer and only plays hard a 3rd of the time. If Geno played as hard as Sidney we would make some noise in the playoffs.
I don’t know. In the first period especially I thought Puljujarvi was the passenger on that line. He had some trouble clearing the puck and seemed to get a little lost in the D zone in the third on one shift. But he has the ability to be physical. I thought he had his best shift in the third when he was on the forecheck and threw two good checks. That’s kind of who he is in my mind. That’s what I expect from him.
We all saw this coming, right?
I have nothing negative to say tonight about this team tonight…yes, we have flaws (but so does everybody else)…we just hammered the team that went to Game 7 last year, it’s ok to feel good tonight…our PP is deadly right now, scoring almost every game…we battled the whole 3rd period and didn’t blow a 2 goal lead…our 3rd line players scored 2 goals tonight…they got 2 goals because of dumb penalties…
One thing for sure after tonight, we know who our No. 1 goalie is…no way 35 competes like that tonight
The only negative thing to say is how god awful it is that Rearden made it through the whole season last year managing the power play. The simple unwillingness to make a change when it was obvious to a bat at high noon resulted in Pens fans missing at least 4 playoff games.