The last few weeks haven’t been easy for Kristopher Letang, who recovered fairly quickly from a cerebrovascular accident (CVA), but now the Quebecer is starting to produce again. In his third game since returning, he helped the Pittsburgh Penguins beat the Florida Panthers 4-2 at Sunrise on Wednesday night.
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The defender collected a goal and an assist, he who was left off the top scorer list this week, and the Pens signed a seventh straight win.
Midway through a Panthers power play in the second period, Ryan Poehling cleared a puck that teammate Bryan Rust recovered in central territory. At two to one, he tagged to Letang, who scored the fifth goal of his career from a man down.
The Penguins special teams worked flat out, batting twice on three power plays. Jake Guentzel skilfully deflected a throw from Evgeni Malkin, bordering on legality. Letang collected an assist for this action.
Malkin doubled the visitors’ lead in the third period, also on the power play. Sam Reinhart closed the gap midway through the third but to no avail, largely due to Guentzel’s second, into the empty net. Ryan Lomberg was the Panthers’ other goalscorer.
It was a busy evening for both goalkeepers. Tristan Jarry won with 32 saves while Sergei Bobrovsky made 35 saves in the loss.
Playing the 574th game of his career, Aaron Ekblad ousted Robert Svehla for most games played by a defenseman in a Panthers uniform.
Ovechkin partially neutralized
Everyone in Washington was excited to see what Alexander Ovechkin would do after hitting the 800-goal mark with a hat-trick in his last game. The Russian, just a goal behind Gordie Howe, failed to find the Capitals’ goal in a 2-1 loss to the Dallas Stars.
The captain of the “Caps” did not emerge from this game completely empty-handed, as he was an accomplice in Conor Sheary’s 10th goal of the season in the second period. However, it was the only success for the home side, who faced Jake Oettinger 45 times.
The young keeper kept his team in the game while the stars needed time to get going. Just forty-eight seconds into the third period, Jamie Benn broke the ice for Dallas on the power play. Colin Miller scored the winning goal 1:29 later.
The hard wall
In Newark, Carter Hart rode most of the New Jersey Devils’ onslaught, finishing with 48 saves in a 2-1 Philadelphia Flyers win.
The local hero shot at least 14 times per third at the goal defended by the 24-year-old goalkeeper. Jack Hughes beat him on the power play early in the game, but Hart then slammed the door and shut up in four more shorthanded situations.
Scott Laughton in the second period and Travis Konecny in the middle of the third period had goals on target for the Flyers. Vitek Vanecek was much less busy than his counterpart, yielding twice on 24 shots.
It’s the fourth consecutive loss for the Devils, who had won 13 times online between October 25 and November 21.