Penguins vs. Capitals, Game 5 Recap

Tonight the Penguins accomplished a third straight victory in their series with a shocking overtime period goal by Evgeni Malkin, which was actually intended as a pass to Sidney Crosby. Tom Poti dove in on the puck, deflecting the rubber right past an unsuspecting Simeon Varlamov. Varlamov had been knocked over by a stumbling Crosby moments beforehand, as Sid the Kid ran into Capitals defenseman Brian Pothier. After the game, the Russian goaltender went on record in a translated interview, and said, "it's always hard when you play in overtime and you allow a silly goal like this."

Becoming the first away team to win in this series, this brings Pittsburgh to a 3-2 advantage over the Capitals, who have never recorded a 'W' against the Pens in any of the 8 Game 5 match-ups they've had in Playoffs past.

Due to a knee-to-knee injury by way of power-forward Ovechkin on Friday, Sergei Gonchar was scratched for this game, although reports from the coaching staff have revealed that the injury is minor and that Gonchar will likely return to the ice in short order. Until then, Alex Goligoski's been pulled from the team's AHL affiliate, the Scranton Penguins.

Ruslan Fedotenko continued on a bit of a hot streak, having provided one of Friday night's goals and lighting up the scoreboard in period two, with an added assist, to boot.

Prior to Game 5 a dark light had been cast upon one Evgeni Malkin, as some were disowning the leading goal-scorer for the regular season, claiming he hadn't quite been himself and that although he was doing a fine job of setting up some plays, his head just didn't seem to be in the game. Thankfully for Pittsburgh, he retook his place on the team with a third-period assist, as well as the deciding goal.

On nights like tonight, when the Capitals play such flat defense and the Penguins are actually engaged, it seems that Alexander Ovechkin must be the only thing this team has going for them. While this series has not been so entirely engaging that it might've captivated someone who isn't much for the puck, it has shown two anti-climatic game-changing deflections on the part of the Caps. What could they be thinking?

I'm anxiously awaiting Game 6, and look forward to sharing my thoughts about it and about all the other games I can manage to catch in the coming weeks. I hope that you've enjoyed my first blog. There are going to be many more to come, and I'm sure that the quality will improve as I grow more comfortable with discussing hockey in this format. This is all I've really ever wanted to do.