Home winning streak hits 10

you know is going to give you a chance to be successful, and you don’t waver from that,” Murray said after stopping 34 of 35 shots. “You stick to your game plan. You stick to what you can control.

“That’s what we’re doing. I think that’s why we’re playing well, especially in third periods. I think we’re dictating the pace of play for the most part. That’s what we need to do in order to give ourselves the best chance to win.”

This win was especially meaningful for Murray, who was playing the 100th NHL game of his career. He’s 6224-7 in those games, the most wins for a goaltender in his first 100 games in debuts made since 2005-06.

Furthermore, Murray has won six in a row at PPG Paints Arena and is 7-0-1 with a 2.41 goals-against average and a .926 save percentage over his past eight games.

“He’s getting back to where he wants to be and where we need him to be to go places,” Carl Hagelin said. “It’s fun to watch. He’s got a lot of confidence. He’s calm and composed. He’s a big part of this team.”

Among Murray’s best saves were a left-toe stop on Dustin Brown on a shorthanded breakaway in the second period and a diving, sprawling stop on Michael Amadio a few minutes later, lunging left to right and using his body to make the stop. They’re the same stops that Oleksiak has become accustomed to seeing since being traded here by Dallas.

“The guy makes some sick saves,” Oleksiak said. “He’s definitely a fun guy to watch. It’s nice to know you have a guy like that back there.”

Murray was great, but he was hardly the only reason to feel good after this one. Among the others: • That third period. Tied 11, the Penguins got a powerplay goal from Zach AstonReese at 5:24 to pull ahead and an empty-netter from Evgeni Malkin to seal it.

More than the scoring, it was how the Penguins comported themselves.

“I thought the third period was one of the best periods we’ve played in a while,” Penguins coach Mike Sullivan said. “We stayed with it. I thought our puck-pursuit game was very good. We took care of the puck. We made sure we made good decisions and didn’t feed their transition game.”

• Ryan Reaves scored in the second period, his second goal in the past five games. He has seemingly responded very well to being a healthy scratch.

• Aston-Reese stuck with Sidney Crosby the entire game and looked good while doing it, piling up eight shot attempts, including four that he put on goal, to go along with three hits, a takeaway and a blocked shot.

Patric Hornqvist will be back soon, but if this keeps up, Aston-Reese, who plays a similar game, isn’t going anywhere.

“The power-play goal we got, [Aston-Reese] provided the screen to take the goalie’s sightlines away,” Sullivan said.

“If he’s not there, we probably don’t score that goal. He has a lot of similar attribute to what ‘Horny’ has.”

That’s never a bad comparison for a young player.

• Malkin got his 18th goal in the past 17 games, Hagelin continued to create problems with his speed, and Kris Letang assisted on Aston-Reese’s goal, finishing as a plus-2.

“As a team, we’re gaining confidence every night,” Hagelin said. “We’re finding ways to win games.”

And it starts with the Penguins’ 23-year-old franchise netminder.