Letang scores twice in win
Penguins jump out to 6-2 start
Patric Hornqvist was all smiles after the latest Penguins win. And why not?
He tallied three points Friday night as the Penguins beat the Dallas Stars, 4-2, at PPG Paints Arena. He had one of the best seats in the house for Kris Letang’s ridiculous goal. And his team has a fivegame winning streak and is getting healthier.
But in that joyful home locker room, the veteran forward got serious for a second when asked about two key saves Matt Murray made in the second period.
“Huge,” he said. “You know what? That’s a 2-0 game there, and I’m probably not standing here laughing right now. That’s why you get paid the big bucks.”
Keep it up, and the bucks get bigger for Murray. More on that in a minute.
The Penguins trailed the struggling Stars, 1-0, in the second period and the game was in danger of slipping away when Stars winger Denis Gurianov rang a shot off the left post and the rebound came right to five-time All-Star Tyler Seguin.
Staring at a mostly-empty net, Seguin fired the puck right into Murray’s pad. He got a second whack in the crease, but Murray got his left arm on that one.
“I just tried to get something over there,” Murray said of that sequence.
Two minutes later, Jared McCann tied it up. Marcus Pettersson was in the process of winding up a slap shot. He spotted McCann and in mid-swing changed the angle to fire a pass to McCann, who poked it past Anton Khudobin.
“Those were two big stops. They gave us a chance to score on the other end,” said Pettersson, adding, “You kind of grow as a team when see those saves.”
Murray’s play this season has been overlooked with Sidney Crosby dominating, American Hockey League call-ups contributing and the Penguins scoring 32 goals in eight games. But he has delivered the goods in six of his seven starts.
He kept the Penguins in the opener, then played a prominent role in wins against Columbus, Anaheim and Colorado. Friday, Murray got bailed out by the post on multiple occasions. But he made 21 saves, including 11 in a sloppy second period.
This season is a pivotal one for the twotime Stanley Cup-winner, still just 25.
Murray, for all his playoff success, has yet to put together a regular season that gets him into the Vezina Trophy conversation. In the past, he battled relatively minor injuries and bouts of inconsistency. Last season was no different, though he did pull it together in the second half to help lug the Penguins into the playoffs.
And Murray will be a restricted free agent next summer. The Penguins get the right to match any offer he gets. Murray, of course, would have to be open to leaving the Penguins, which he has given no indication of wanting to do.
But the Penguins are projected to be in an even more perilous salary-cap position then than they are now and likely would have to make Murray their top priority.
“He’s tremendous. He’s so confident in that net. And it’s amazing to see and awesome to play in front of,” defenseman Brian Dumoulin said.
Letang has been showing up every night, too, usually in a good way. He has four goals and six assists in eight games after scoring two goals against the Stars.
After Roope Hintz beat Murray on a breakaway and McCann, back in the lineup after a one-game absence due to injury, tied it, Letang put the Penguins up with one of the prettiest of his career.
With a flick of his stick, the blue-liner got Joe Pavelski to drop to the ice. Letang faked another shot, this time convincing Seguin to leave his skates. Gliding backwards, he dangled the puck past Seguin, then pivoted toward Khudobin.
The Stars goalie was in good position as Letang attacked from an acute angle. But Letang somehow got Khudobin to drop to his knees and open his pads.
“It’s just instinct when you get that close to the net,” said Letang, who has a point in seven of the past eight games.
Four minutes after that goal, Hornqvist redirected Dumoulin’s shot from the point past Khudobin to make it 3-1. The eventual winner was Hornqvist’s fourth goal this season. That’s more than he had in his final 40 games last season.
John Klingberg put a shot through a crowd and past Murray to pull the Stars back within a goal. But Letang sealed it on an empty-netter with 22 seconds left.