Penguins @ Blackhawks

Pittsburgh 5 Chicago 6 (so)

Hawks Win Wild One

The Chicago Blackhawk led by two, and were down by two, but still managed to take the two points in a classic match up at the United Center last night.

The Hawks started extremely quickly, jumping out to a two goal lead with markers from Vrbata and Holmqvist before the Penguins exploded for four goals in a twenty minute period from 10.14 of the first, outshooting the Hawks 22-6 in the process. Even though the Blackhawks only managed one shot in the second period in total, they made it count with Michal Handzus pulling them to within one before the Hawks actually took the lead in a much improved third period with goals from Denis Arkhipov and Bryan Smolinski. Chicago thought they had done enough for the win, but Pittsburgh got the equaliser with forty two seconds left after sustained pressure on the Hawk net to force OT.

A scoreless overtime followed, so the Hawks were headed to their second shootout of the season. Malone missed the first while Havlat scored, then the rest of the shooters all drew blanks with Crosby, Handzus and Jarkko Ruutu all failing to light the lamp to allow the Blackhawks to snap a two game losing streak.

shots on goal:
Penguins 39
Chicago 21

Three Stars:
1. Sidney Crosby (Pit)
2. Nils Ekman (Pit)
3. Mikael Holmqvist (Chi)

Terrific game this one - lots of action!