The Rookies Shine and Jarry Stops 31; Crosby Scores Dramatic OT Winner

Mike Sullivan took a calculated gamble when the Pittsburgh Penguins faced Ottawa Sunday evening at PPG Paints Arena.

No, not when he deployed rookie forwards Rutger McGroarty and Ville Koivunen on his top two lines and used them on the power play.

Sure, those two entered the game with a combined three games of NHL experience, all on McGroarty’s resume, but both have shown promising offensive ability with the Penguins’ farm team in Wilkes-Barre. And, hey, nobody who turned up on the Penguins’ bottom-six has done enough to merit a more prominent role, anyway.

No, Sullivan’s big risk was starting Tristan Jarry in goal for the fourth game in a row, considering that he had been pulled from the previous two after allowing a total of eight goals on 19 shots.

Sullivan presumably was hoping that Jarry, who never had been yanked from consecutive games before last week, would have a solid bounce-back performance, to begin repairing some of the damage those flameouts had done to his confidence.

It worked.

Better than Sullivan likely could have imagined.

Jarry stopped all 31 shots the Senators threw at him and Sidney Crosby scored a power-play goal at 1:16 of overtime to give the Penguins a 1-0 victory. Crosby beat Senators goalie Anton Forsberg with a slap shot from near the right dot for his 27th of the season.

Erik Karlsson and Rickard Rakell assisted on the game-winner, which came on the Penguins’ 35th shot.

The Penguins got that man-advantage because Ottawa winger Ridly Greig was called for hooking with 2.1 seconds remaining in regulation.

The victory was the Penguins’ first in seven games against the Senators (1-3-3) and raised their record to 30-34-11.

Neither McGroarty nor Koivunen looked out of place at this level. McGroarty played 16:57 and had three shots, four hits and a blocked shot, while Koivunen had two shots in 17:28 of work.

“I thought they both had great games,” Sullivan said.

The Penguins were shorthanded for the first 1:53 of the third period while Ryan Graves served a minor penalty assessed late in the second, but got through that stretch of 5-on-4 play without incident.

Crosby and Senators defenseman Artem Zub were assessed roughing minors with 2:36 to go in regulation after a scuffle behind the Ottawa net, and Shane Pinto nearly put Ottawa in front seconds later, but his shot caromed off the right post.

Jarry gave Sullivan no reason during the first period to second-guess the decision to start him again, as he turned aside all 16 pucks Ottawa threw at him. Several of those saves were noteworthy, including a pair he made on Greig from close range about 5 1/2 minutes into the game.

The Penguins got the only power play during the opening period, as Ottawa center Dylan Cozens was penalized for holding at 6:24, but they were unable to capitalize.

Jarry got his right shoulder on a shot from the slot by Senators winger Claude Giroux, a longtime Penguins nemesis, just over six minutes into the second period, and Rakell nearly put the Penguins in front about 2 1/2 minutes later, but his slap shot slammed off the left post behind Forsberg.

Ottawa got its first chance with the extra man when Graves was sent off for interference with 6.4 seconds to go before the second intermission. Jarry made a good stop on Drake Batherson as time was winding down to keep the score 0-0, the first time this season that neither the Penguins nor their opponent got a goal during the first 40 minutes.

The Pittsburgh Penguins are scheduled to practice Monday at noon at PPG Paints Arena. The workout will be there, rather than UPMC Lemieux Sports Complex, so that the annual team photo can be taken before practice.