It didn’t happen exactly that way – he had his chances, but he didn’t bury them. “As a result of that he deserved a game because of the camp he had….I didn’t want him sitting too long”. “But it’s one of 82”. Coach Mike Johnston said after the game that “we’ll make a few changes and adjustments” because “we do have to get our power play in synch”.
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Kessel says he enjoyed his stay in Toronto but that it’s time to move on. “Was it understanding? Fitness?” “I think that’s a real key thing for players of that level, that they get to 300-plus shots per year”.
“I sat in the penalty box and had fresh legs”, Malkin said of his goal. “I thought [Thursday] when we put them all together, we had a few really good looks on the power play”.
A win against them made it little easier.
“We had lots of scoring chances and power plays”.
Malkin, on the importance of winning again: “It’s not a pretty win tonight, but every game is important, important for confidence for the team”. It doesn’t matter who’s going to score. “I was very excited, just getting the shot off and seeing it go to the back of the net”.
Desperate for another Cup, Pittsburgh took a big swing in landing Kessel and the seven remaining years of his contract this past summer. Only the ovation for Sidney Crosby was louder than Kessel’s when the starting lineups were announced at the Consol Energy Center.
The transition Kessel makes from stick-handle to shot is something Kunitz believes his teammates, and especially the Penguins goaltenders, could learn quite a bit from.
Johnston reunited Crosby and Malkin on the No. 1 power play and that unit generated several good chances, but the Penguins failed to score on three tries with the extra man, including a 5-on-3 for 81 seconds. He’s usually better with the puck than that. And his playmaking ability is high end. “Making little passes, how he’s able to read the play”. “We’ll see how he progresses”. Probably [the playmaking] was probably the most underrated I felt.
“That was definitely weird, seeing him on the other side”, said Leaf defenceman Jake Gardiner. “Obviously I loved my time in Toronto. You have to be ready”.
Pittsburgh had a brief power play to start the game, but a Bernier pad save came all the way out to a breaking Mark Arcobello. The Leafs still haven’t settled on a bonafide number one guy, in large part because neither Bernier or James Reimer have stepped up to seize the top job.
One storyline the game was robbed of was seeing two friends line up against each other.
The Leafs played without Tyler Bozak, who was scratched with a lower body injury that occurred in the second period of the 6-3 victory over the Columbus Blue Jackets on Friday.
“Any time you were on a team, you always want to beat them”, said Winnik.
Sometimes winning the game, even against your old team, is enough. The Penguins haven’t scored more than two goals in a single game, but they have still managed to win their last two contests.
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Jonathan Bernier will get the nod Saturday, but has dropped all five career decisions (0-3-2) to Pittsburgh while recording a 3.55 goals-against average.ABOUT THE PENGUINS (1-3-0): Evgeni Malkin, who scored his first goal of the young season in Thursday’s 2-0 victory over Ottawa, has tormented Toronto in his career. “We saw in the second and third (period) what he was capable of but we need that at the start of the game too”. In the third goal, the goal was awarded to Leo Komarov, who deemed to have deflected Gardiner’s shot into the net.
