DETROIT — The Pittsburgh Penguins (19-12-9) played perhaps their best defensive games of the season. When the Detroit Red Wings (24-15-4) pulled their goalie with just under two minutes remaining, the Penguins had yielded just 12 shots on goal.
New year, new luck. Rather than timid play against an extra attacker, Rickard Rakell (5) snapped a loose puck into the empty Detroit net with 59 seconds remaining, and Connor Dewar (7) added another one, as the Penguins beat Detroit 4-1 at Little Caesars Arena.
The Penguins have won four in a row. It was also the fewest shots the team has ever allowed in a road game, per Penguins historian Bob Grove.
The Penguins rigidly held their defensive posture for most of the game, holding Detroit without a shot for the first 13:04. In fact, with 2:30 left in the second period, the Penguins had as many goals (2) as Detroit had shots. By the end of 40 minutes, the Penguins were outshooting Detroit 19-9.
The Penguins allowed only three more shots in the third period for a 31-12 final shot total, outshooting Detroit 12-3 in the third.
Early in the first period, Penguins defenseman Parker Wotherspoon stepped into a Detroit rush, intercepting a pass and quickly sending a counterattack to captain Sidney Crosby.
Crosby slipped a cross-ice pass to Bryan Rust (16), who beat Detroit goalie John Gibson with a shot from the left circle to the far post at 3:44 for a 1-0 lead.
Late in the first period, the Penguins’ reconstructed Kids Line added to the lead. Center Ben Kindel spotted Yegor Chinakhov with a three-zone stretch pass. Chinakhov (4) scored on the breakaway, his first Penguins goal at 17:30 of the first.
Detroit had just nine shots after 40 minutes, but one of those changed the course of the game. As the Penguins attacked through the later stages of the second period, defenseman Kris Letang’s shot missed high and caromed out of the zone, launching Detroit’s Alex Brincat’s two-on-one rush.
DeBrincat (22) whistled a low wrister past Skinner at 15:06 of the second to halve the Penguins’ lead, 2-1.
As they did in the first, the Penguins doubled Detroit’s shots in the second period, too. The Penguins outshot the hosts 9-4, for a 19-9 shot advantage. Despite the shot advantage, NaturalStatTrick.com showed the scoring chances nearly even, 14-12 in the Penguins’ favor, but a 4-3 Detroit advantage in high-danger chances.
The Penguins also beat Detroit in a penalty-filled game on Thursday at PPG Paints Arena.
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Categorized: Penguins Postgame