Pens clinch 4th seed and home ice 5-2 v Rangers

Wow, is there a Penguins game against an Atlantic Division rival that does NOT come with post game drama anymore?  First things first, the Penguins beat the Rangers 5-2 tonight, clinching home ice advantage in the series against the Flyers, who eliminated Buffalo tonight with a victory against the Sabres.  Some notable milestones tonight include the fact that Marc Andre Fleury added to his career high season win total by getting his 42nd W of the year, and he tied Tom Barrasso's team record of 226 victories.  He is only one victory behind Pekka Rinne for the league lead this season.  The 35 save effort was a good sign, as Fleury had struggled in his past three outings, going 0-3 and posting a GAA of 5.31 and save percentage of .787.  Good to see the MAF we had grown used to back between the pipes tonight!   The win was the 50th of the season for Pittsburgh, marking only the 2nd time in franchise history they have gotten 50 victories in a season.  They are 50-25-6, good for 106 points.  Pascal Dupuis also extended his league leading point streak to 16 points with an assist on the Richard Park goal in the second period.  Finally, Evgeni Malkin scored his career high 49th goal, and added an assist to run his league leading point total to 107 points.  Geno has an 11 point lead on Steven Stamkos, who has 2 games remaining to catch Malkin, who has one game left.  The Art Ross should be considered Geno's at this point!  Congratulations Geno!  The Penguins will have to decide if it is worth risking injury in Saturday's meaningless contest against Philadelphia to allow Geno to take a shot at becoming only the 6th Russian player to score 50 or more goals in the NHL.  The others were Mogilny, Ovechkin, Fedorov, Kovalchuk, and Bure, who did it 5 times.  Tonights controversy came late in the game, when Brooks Orpik who had lost positon to Derek Stepan stuck out his leg, creating a knee on knee collision that sent Stepan flying.  Orpik was assessed a 5 minute major penalty and a game misconduct on the play, and may face discipline from the league.  Tortorella went bat shit, and to an extent, I can understand him relative to the Orpik hit, as it was a dangerous play.  I don't think it was premeditated, I do agree with Bylsma that Stepan changed direction at the last second, but it did look like Orpik opened his hip and made a dangerous play to stop Stepan from blowing by him.  It is in the gray area for me related to suspendable hits based on the Rupp hit on Staal, as it was similar to that hit which had no disciplinary action or subsequent whining,  and the lack of discipline for the Nystrom hit on Letang which was every bit as dangerous.  The kangaroo court will have to decide.  I anticipate, a game, maybe two coming from Shanadouche, which could leave the Penguins without Orpik for the beginning of the Flyers series.  Tortorella's shots at the Penguins (calling the team the most arrogant in hockey), and the shots at Malkin and Crosby as whiners were not necessary or professional, but hey neither is Tortorella.  Seriously, I usually don't mind Torts, but again, pot, meet kettle, you're black sir.  And Marty Biron?  Who cares what he thinks anyway?   As for the game, a short summary follows as I am supposed to be hanging out in NYC, not writing a blog post right now.

The Penguins got on the board ealy at the 1:11 mark as Chris Kunitz knocked home his 25th goal of the campaign, assisted by Kris Letang (31), and Evgeni Malkin (58).   The  Penguins led 1-0.  At the 4:23 mark the Rags tied it when Brandon Dubinsky netted his 10th goal of the season.  By the way, loving that big mouthed Dubinsky has one less goal than Tyler Kennedy this season!  It was now a 1-1 game. At the 8:27 mark the aforementioned Tyler Kennedy scored his 11th of the season, assisted by Jordan Staal, who made a great play to keep the play alive and Zybnek Michalek who launched a bomb that created a juicy rebound for the suddenly hot Tyler Kennedy to slam home. Kennedy now has 11 points in his last 13 games, and the Penguins retook the lead 2-1.

At the 5:11 mark of the second period Richard Park scored his 7th goal of the season, assisted by Pascal Dupuis (34) and Eric Tangradi (2).  The goal was significant as Duper extended his scoring streak and, well Tangradi got a point.  The Penguins led 3-1. At the 9:06 mark Evgeni Malkin got his 49th goal of the year, assisted by Kunitz (34) and Crosby (28).  The Penguins now led 4-1.  Late in the third  period, Artem Anisimov scored a power goal at the 17:46 mark on the Brooks Orpik major penalty to make it 4-2.  Kris Letang got his 10th goal of the season into an empty net, assisted by Jordan Staal to close out the scoring at 5-2.