Pens Put Rangers On The Brink
April 30th, 2008 by sheashuThe game has been over for a few hours now and I have just one question. Did that just really happen? My blood pressure just returned to normal about 5 minutes ago and my hands are still shaking after being put through the torture that was Game 3. Think I’m joking? Call up Tums and ask them who their best customer is cause it’s this guy.
During the game I looked at a co-worker and said, “I remember when the Pens weren’t in the playoffs over the last couple years. I remember saying then that I wished we were in the playoffs. Now that we’re in again, I’m slowly realizing why I have a love/hate relationship with seeing the Pens in the playoffs.”
Here’s why, when they weren’t in it was much easier to just sit back and complain about how terrible we were and look ahead to the future to when we would be back in the playoffs again. There was no pressure, no high blood pressure, no ulcers etc. Now that we’re in the playoffs again and doing well, I’m afraid to even speak about the team to friends and family, much less come on here and write for you all for fear of waking up from what has got to be a dream. Every second that goes by feels like an eternity during the games. Every goal scored against feels like someone is stabbing me in the chest. Every goal we score results in a near orgasmic euphoria. I know this may sound nuts, but real fans out there know what I’m talking about. For as much as I hate the nervousness and torture of watching playoff hockey, I love every minute of it. It’s just a good thing that the playoffs only last for a couple months each year because I never would have seen my 24th birthday.
Anyway onto tonight’s game. The only complaint I have tonight about the game is the same one you’ve heard me say about this team down the stretch. We had a near cataclysmic meltdown in the second period. We led 3-1 after the first and yet for some reason I knew the letdown was coming. Even as I saw it happening I couldn’t turn away. It was like watching a train wreck where you want to look away, but try as you might, you just can’t do it. I was talking to my buddy Gopher during the game and while he was running around his living room when the Jagr walked around the cage and rifled a wrister past Fleury for the tying goal, I said to Gopher “Remember that letdown I’ve been harping on? You’ve now witnessed it first hand.”
Michael Therrien immediately calls a time out, which was obviously the correct move as the Rangers tied the game in just over a minute. You’d think the time out would have been a wake up call to the Pens. Nope. They came out after the breather just as flat as they had started the period and if not for the sweet sweet sound of iron, the Rangers would have led 4-3 and I would have been throwing things. Instead, the puck rings out and a couple minutes later Ryan Hollweg takes a completely stupid boarding penalty and Malkin comes to the rescue once again.
That was the key moment in the game tonight. I work right up the street from MSG and I felt the wind blow immediately after the Malkin goal. My theory is that the breeze that went by was the rush of air being let out of the arena. It was that huge.
The Pens then come out in the third period and played the same lock down defense they played in Game 2 and got the insurance marker to put us up 5-3.
You could see the Rangers just weren’t skating the way they had for the first two periods. They had accepted that they were losing this game and were just going through the motions. Their power play was atrocious in the third period. All five guys were just standing around playing patty-cake with each other. There was no passion, no effort. I’m not complaining as a Pens fan, just merely stating what I saw.
All I wanted in NY was a split and we’ve already earned it. Now we have a chance to make quick work of the Rangers and rest up for either Montreal or Philadelphia. I’m not overlooking the fact that twice in NHL history a team has come back from an 0-3 hole to win the series and the Pens were one of those team that have blown the lead. This series is not over. We need to come out in Game 4 and weather the storm again, bide our time and play our game. If we do that, we just might pull off the sweep.
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