Pens eliminate Blue Jackets with win in Game 5
Mika Zibanejad scores OT winner to lift Rangers past Canadiens in Game 5
Sidney Crosby and Scott Wilson scored 51 seconds apart in the third period, helping the Pittsburgh Penguins eliminate the Columbus Blue Jackets with a 5-2 win in Game 5 of their firstround series on Thursday night.
Bryan Rust scored twice for Pittsburgh, Phil Kessel added his second of the playoffs and Marc-Andre Fleury finished with 49 saves. The defending Stanley Cup champions will face the winner of the Toronto Washington series in the conference semifinals starting next week.
William Karlsson and Boone Jenner scored for the Blue Jackets, but Sergei Bobrovsky stopped just 27 of 32 shots to finish a forgettable series.
Columbus trailed by three in the second period but had a potential tying goal waved off in the third for interference. Pittsburgh responded immediately. Crosby’s one-timer on the power play restored a two-goal lead and Wilson’s backhand less than a minute later finished off the Blue Jackets.
Columbus avoided being swept with a spirited 5-4 win on Tuesday, extending the series by playing with the kind of desperation Pittsburgh coach Mike Sullivan insisted his team needed if it wanted to get some rest before the second round.
It’s a refrain Sullivan has preached repeatedly over the last couple weeks and once again, the Penguins didn’t listen.
And once again, they were able to get away with it thanks
to Fleury. He fended off 15 shots in the first period alone, several of them from point-blank range. It gave the Penguins time to find their legs, and Kessel’s wrist shot from the top of the circle 9:07 into the first put Pittsburgh in front.
When Rust scored twice less than three minutes apart early in the second — both of them on backhand rebounds — the Penguins appeared to be in control.
The Blue Jackets, trying to extend a breakthrough season that included a franchise-record 108 points and the sixth-best record in the league, showed one last flash. Karlsson and Jenner beat Fleury twice in 2:54 at the game’s midway point and Columbus was right back in it.
The surge ended when Fleury flopped to the ground after Alex Wenneberg clipped the goaltender as he fought off a check in the crease five minutes into the third. Columbus coach John
Tortorella and the rest of the Blue Jackets bench erupted in anger. Things only got worse for Columbus when Crosby powered a shot from just above the goal line by Bobrovsky. Wilson pushed the lead to three when he casually tapped a backhand by a woefully out of position Bobrovsky.
Rangers 3, Canadiens 2 (OT)
MONTREAL — Mika Zibanejad scored 14:22 into overtime to give the New York Rangers a 3-2 victory over the Montreal Canadiens on Thursday night in Game 5 of their Eastern Conference quarter-final series.
Chris Kreider’s shot on a rush went off Alexei Emelin’s stick right to Zibanejad for a shot into an open side.
The Rangers lead the best-ofseven series 3-2 and can end it with a win in Game 6 Saturday in New York.
Jesper Fast and Brady Skjei also scored for New York.
Artturi Lehkonen scored and set up a goal by Brendan Gallagher in the first period for Montreal.
Montreal outshot the Rangers 33-25 in regulation time but shots were 36-36 after overtime.
Mats Zuccarello wasted a glittering chance to give New York the early lead when he couldn’t lift the puck over Carey Price’s pad from the doorstep in the opening minute.
Montreal finally struck first as Lehkonen fought off Marc Staal to put a spin-around shot off the side of the net and score on a wrap-around at 12:07.
Kevin Hayes was serving a holding call when Fast got his second of the series shorthanded, finishing a two-on-two counterattack after taking a slick feed from Zibanejad at 15:56.
Only 25 seconds later, Andrei Markov slipped a pass into the slot for an unguarded Gallagher to score on a snap shot.
Skjei tied the game at 18:28 of the second frame. Rich Nash took the puck to the net and Skjei was on the spot to bang the rebound into an open side.
Skjei is the first Rangers rookie defenceman with two playoff goals since Brian Leetch had three in 1989.
Phillip Danault hit a goalpost shorthanded in the opening minute and Max Pacioretty was stopped on a breakaway by Henrik Lundqvist in a scoreless third period in which New York had most of the sustained pressure.
Kreider had a chance to end the game 10 minutes into overtime but whiffed on a Zibanejad pass at the doorstep.