Kunitz Tags Two, Sid Ices the Shootout: Pens top Canes 5-4

Hurricanes Blog: Canes Country

It was a back-and-forth game for the Pens and Canes, your typical "whoever scores last gets the win" sort of game.  The Pens may have given up a goal with 52 seconds remaining in regulation, but they did manage to skate away with the win in shootout fashion to earn that extra point.

No harm done in the end.

More after the jump...

It wasn't Marc-Andre Fleury's best night of the season but it was definitely better than those six games in the loss column as he improved to 4-0-1 over his last five starts.  Letting up a goal less than a minute in was a pleasant sight for those who love to hate the guy, but outside of that he wasn't any worse than Carolina's Justin Peters.  Hindsight I can't decide if that's a compliment or not, but in a game like this it wasn't all about what the teams were keeping out of the net, it was more about who was lighting the lamp.

Chalk up two goals for Chris Kunitz, a man on a mission as of late as he's now registered five goals and an assist in the month of November.  Sure, it's just a blip on the radar for a guy like Sidney Crosby or Evgeni Malkin, but if you're getting five goals out of a guy like Kunitz it's going to be a good month.

Crosby reached a season-best four-point night (1g, 3a) in the win and improved his point streak to eight straight games.  More specifically: 18 points in eight games.  Ridiculous.

Malkin was the subject of some scrutiny following his pointless effort against the Canucks but sure as hell made up for it against the Hurricanes with three assists, the most helpers he's registered in a game so far this season.

And then there's Kris Letang.  It's always nice to have a defenseman put in a productive night even if it doesn't exactly pad his regular season stats.  But to his credit, he did tally an assist in the win and of course set the shootout up for Sid to put the nail in the coffin.  He just keeps getting better and better with each game.

And hey, what do you know; the Pens picked up a goal with the man advantage.  In fact, saying they converted on 50% of their power-play chances sounds a lot more flattering than saying they went 1-for-2.  So for the sake of this power-play's performance lately and to strike fear into the hearts of opponents - look out.  The Pens just scored on 50% of their chances while on the man advantage.

We'll just have to burn the evidence.

Comment of the night goes to our girl Cari:

I’m going to blame Eric Staal. The least he could do for his injured baby brother is not try so hard against his team.

What you don't know is that Jordan beat the Canes 9-1 in NHL 11 from his seat in the press box.