Following a fun win over the Blues and a less fun trade deadline, Columbus travelled down I-70 East to face the Penguins. With the remaining Domi-less roster sure they’d stay in Ohio through April, how would they play against one of the hottest teams in the league?
First Period
The game started with the Blue Jackets struggling to get into the offensive zone, as the flightless birds did a good job clogging things up between the bluelines. They got their chances, including a fanned puck by Kapanen off a beautiful feed from the newly-acquired Rakell, and a power play from a not-exactly-fantastic Gabriel Carlsson penalty. The penalty would be killed, with Vladislav Gavrikov in particular doing a nice job.
Around the one third mark of the period, Columbus would get a rare double minor power play as a rogue Matheson stick drew blood on Bjorkstrand. With the first of the set about to expire, Werenski and Voracek would play some pattycake near the blueline before the former fired a shot on net. Gustav Nyquist would tip it on the way, enough to get past Jarry, and then poke it in to finish her off.
BLUE JACKETS POWER PLAY GOAL – Gustav Nyquist from Zach Werenski and Jakub Voracek – 8:37 1st, 1-0 Columbus
Nyquist with his 16th of the SZN
pic.twitter.com/iZUyQNdvJF— CBJ Artillery (@CBJArtillery) March 22, 2022
The second unit got the majority of the second power play, and nothing much got done.
After that, the Penguins would maintain most of the control, though struggled to get shots on goal until the last few minutes. Justin Danforth would go off for holding with :23.5 remaining, giving the Penguins enough opportunities for this lovely little stat:
Joonas Korpisalo had more saves in that period (12) than his last two appearances combined (6+5) pic.twitter.com/fxaxyEB5sf
— The Cannon (@cbjcannon) March 22, 2022
I’m sure I won’t regret that tweet!
Second Period:
The Blue Jackets successfully killed their penalty. And then everything went to shit.
PENGUINS GOAL – Radim Zohorna from Brian Boyle and Chad Ruhwedel – 2:40 2nd, 1-1
36 seconds later…
PENGUINS GOAL – Jake Guentzel from Sidney Crosby and Evan Rodrigues – 3:16 2nd, 2-1 Pittsburgh
4:12 after that…
PENGUINS GOAL – Bryan Rust from Evgeni Malkin and Brian Dumolin – 7:28 2nd, 3-1 Pittsburgh
Hey, look things starting to die down! Hopefully we can get out of this only down two, we;ve come ba…
PENGUINS GOAL – Jake Guentzel (2) from Sidney Crosby and Mike Matheson – 14:06 2nd, 4-1 Pittsburgh
The Jackets were outshot 19-6. Joonas Korpisalo, after a solid period, had a save percentage this period starting with a 7. Onto the next one.
Third Period:
Wait what? Oh no…
The last period was actually surprisingly even. It seemed like Pittsburgh was in control, but the Jackets had a couple decent power plays and the Pens only managed 6 shots on goal in the third. Of course one went in.
PENGUINS 5-on-3 GOAL – Evgeni Malkin from Bryan Rust and Sidney Crosby – 8:54 3rd, 5-1 Pittsburgh
To be honest I kinda checked out for that last period. The only evens of note were Peeke blocking a shot with his knee and staying down (he’d return late in the game) and Voracek hitting the post on the crossbar.
Let us know your thoughts in the comments