Islanders suffer seventh straight loss as Sidney Crosby scores for Penguins in OT
Bruce Bennett/Getty ImagesSydney Crosby's scores a stunner in overtime to give the Penguins a comeback win over the Islanders.
PENGUINS 3, ISLANDERS 2
On Saturday, Alex Ovechkin broke the Islanders hearts with a game-winner in overtime. Tuesday night it was Sidney Crosby's turn.
The Penguins superstar stole yet another win from the lowly Islanders with a highlight reel goal in the waning moments of overtime to hand the Isles their seventh-straight loss in a 3-2 defeat.
With just over a minute to play in the extra frame, Crosby poked the puck away from Thomas Vanek at the Isles blue line, weaved his way through Travis Hamonic and Calvin de Haan, then somehow snuck a backhanded wrister past Anders Nilsson at 3:44 of overtime for his second goal of the night.
'Crosby comes in with speed and somehow the puck trickles in,' said Nilsson, who now has back-to-back overtime losses on his record courtesy of two of the NHL's elite scorers. 'Every goal you let in is a goal you think you could have had. I think I definitely could have had Ovechkin's goal and I probably should have had the game-winning goal today...It stinks we didn't get the two points today.'
The Islanders (8-15-5) opened the game looking like the team that pushed Pittsburgh (19-9-1) to six games in last years playoffs, taking a 2-0 lead into the first intermission behind two goals from Kyle Okposo.
Pittsburgh fired back with a James Neal power play goal with 15.6 seconds to play in the second period. A hook by Kris Letang in the third period provided the Islanders with their best opportunity of the night in a Frans Nielsen penalty shot, but a pad save by Marc-Andre Fluery foiled the threat. Pittsburgh answered seconds later with a game-tying power play goal by Crosby at 8:00 of the third.
The Isles got a power play chance with less than two minutes to play in regulation and should have had a 5-on-3 advantage after a pair of blatant trips by Letang on Vanek in the crease. After no call was made, an irate Vanek received a retaliatory slashing penalty that put the Isles back on their heels through regulation and into overtime.
'This one's probably on me,' Vanek said. 'I lost my cool there at the end and I shouldn't have.'
'I have a lot of respect for those guys, for the officials, and what they do. I know it's a tough job and I wouldn't want to have it,' Okposo said. 'That being said, I thought they missed some calls tonight.'
Despite another admirable effort, the Isles have now dropped 12 of their last 14 games, with little help from their league-worst penalty kill unit.
'For whatever reason against this team, on the power play and the penalty kill we just couldn't stop them,' Jack Capuano said. 'It happened there, it happened in the playoffs last year. They get two tonight to get right back in the game and it can't happen.'
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