The Penguins arrived in Chicago and continued to look more like a MASH unit than a hockey team. The Penguins are playing without 3 of their top 4 scorers in Crosby, Malkin, and Kunitz, as well as solid players like Arron Asham, Dustin Jeffrey, Mark Letestu, Eric Tangradi, and Mike Comrie remains on the shelf. Matt Cooke, back from his four game suspension tied the game 1-1 on a beautiful short handed goal, that makes him the NHL's leading short handed scorer with 6 short handed points. In addition to Cooke's goal, AHL call up Brett Sterling continued to make a case that he belongs at this level by potting his 3rd goal and 5th point in the five games he has been up on the big club. Paul Martin was great tonight, and continued to show why he was such a coveted free agent defenseman. He just shuts down top players one on one, and his steal and set up of the game tying goal was a thing of beauty. Marc Andre Fleury played out of his mind, as this game is a blowout in the first without his stellar play. The second goal he gave up was SOFF, but the Pens are not even in this one without several spectacular saves from MAF. It is hard to say anything bad about this team right now, despite this being their 5th loss in 7 games. They are about as battered a team as I have ever seen, but they played a road game against a desperate Stanley Cup Champion team, and scratched out a point. The Hawks came into the day 4 points out of the last playoff spot in the West, and healthy so trust me this Pens team hanging in there, and sneaking a point is a testament to their character. The Penguins are 10-7-2 without Crosby, and 7-5-1 without Crosby and Malkin. They have also been down Kunitz and Cooke for 4 of those games. That tells you about the character, and general depth of the organization. Interestingly enough, the WBS Pens have been hot despite their main offensive weapons playing in Pittsburgh. Further testament to the depth of the Penguins. They lack top end scoring depth, and Shero needs to convert their wealth of mid range forwards, top notch defensive depth, and UFA veterans into a scoring winger or two for the playoffs. With Crosby back, the MASH unit slowly healing, and two decent scoring forwards, this team is still dangerous. Their biggest worry postgame is the health of Jordan Staal who took a puck to the face area late in the third and did not return. I would hope that Staal is okay, and that we might be seeing Chris Kunitz back by the middle of the week. Come on Ray, throw us a bone, and let's get some offense in da house. We need to hang in there for a couple of weeks, get healthy and hit the stretch run, balls out baby!
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