GAME FOUR RECAP (Penguins 3, Flyers 1)

As a team, the Penguins were outplayed in Game Four. At even strength, from top to bottom, their first and second lines and fourth line didn't generate much of anything in the way of scoring chances or sustained pressure. The Flyers, conversely, were able to manufacture enough scoring chances to take 46 shots at Marc-Andre Fleury. The only problem for them was that he stopped 45 of them.

Fleury didn't exactly play poorly in Game Three. Two or three of the five goals he gave up could be laid at the feet of shoddy defense being played in front of him. Still, though, any time a goalie gives up that many goals, there's cause for concern as to how he'll bounce back. In Fleury's case, he looked confident from the start, and by the middle of the first period it was clear that he'd put the previous game behind him. He had great rebound control and positioning throughout. He stopped several one-timers and made up for minor defensive lapses. In the first, Scott Hartnell entered the zone covered by two or three Penguins, put on the brakes and dished a perfect saucer pass to a wide-open Claude Giroux, but Fleury turned him away, and turned every shot away until the Penguins built their slim two-goal lead. It's not difficult to imagine how much momentum the Flyers would have taken from getting the first goal and feeding off the resultant crowd frenzy, and given how ordinary the Penguins' offense and power play has been, it's not unlikely that the game outcome would have been different if the Flyers had scored first. The line between the Penguins being up 3-1 and down 3-1 is fairly slim here. Take away his phenomenal performance in Game Four and his save on Jeff Carter in Game Two which kept the Flyers from taking a two-goal lead in the third and the series is reversed.

Still, while they leaned heavily on Fleury because their offense and power play had been shut down, the team chipped in where needed by killing penalties better than they have all season and continuing to win clutch faceoffs. Crosby's success rate hovered at 60% again, and while the final game stats weren't heavily tilted in their favor, the Penguins won most of the crucial defensive-zone draws.
The Penguins killed 12:47 of short-handed time, while working with 6:55 of their own power-play time. As is often the case, offense comes from the strangest sources in the playoffs. Matt Cooke takes a stupid penalty and you wonder if this will be the one that leads to that crucial first goal. The Penguins kill the penalty, then as it expires, the Flyers' Kimmo Timonen has the puck at the top of the zone, and his blueline partner sees Cooke step out of the box and floats back to guard against the lead pass. This leaves Timmonen without an outlet, and he turns the puck over and it's sent up to Cooke, who passes it to Chris Kunitz. Kunitz throws the puck at Sidney Crosby and/or the net, and the above-pictured scene occurs. And while the officials did the obligatory replay review, that play's been a goal nearly every time I've seen it happen unless the puck appeared to be kicked in. Sure, it's a tough goal to give up-- as any goal would be in a game that tight-- but the fact that John Stevens is still complaining about it a day later speaks poorly to his focus on the task at hand.

As has been the case all series long, the Penguins' third line-- Jordan Staal, Tyler Kennedy and Matt Cooke-- was again their best line, and produced their lone even-strength goal. Finding linemates for Jordan Staal to center has long been an afterthought for the team in comparison to the search for wingers to play alongside Crosby and Malkin, but as things stand today, Staal's line has the best chemistry from game-to-game. It's got to be killing the Flyers' ability to match lines-- just when they've found the right combinations to shut down the top two lines, the Penguins' third line demands top-line defensive attention. It makes you wonder what the Penguins might be able to do if the top lines are able to put it together. Sykora continues to look forlorn every time he's on the ice; he was set up at the side of the net for a second-period tap in last night when the game was scoreless and couldn't finish. His body language immediately after missing the shot was painful to see. He's dying alive out there. The only upside of this happening now, if you can call it that, is that the team has the luxury of allowing him to play through it because they're managing to win these games.