Penguins strike early, rout Senators 7-0 to take 3-2 lead

“It was just a crap game”, said centre Kyle Turris. That shouldn’t happen in a preseason game, let alone the Eastern Conference Final. “Everybody comes in prepared and ready to go and today we were on heels and just not executing”.

Same as it ever was under Sullivan, who is 12-2 following a playoff loss with the Penguins.

“I think he leads by example and I thought he had one of his best games tonight”, Penguins coach Mike Sullivan said. “Everything we did was wrong”. I view Scott Wilson’s role similarly to the one that Max Talbot played in the 2009 playoffs. I don’t think it was the defining goal … “That’s why it’s so disconcerting”.

Yet the Pittsburgh Penguins responded the way they’ve always responded since Mike Sullivan took over as head coach almost 18 months ago: like champions. “I just tried to skate to the corners”. They got the bounces. Ottawa’s Mike Hoffman gave up the puck and Rust took it easily, eyeing up Penguins defenseman Olli Maatta for the team’s first goal in a four-goal first period that was similar to the four-goal first period the Senators hung on the Penguins in Game 3. The run follows a seven-game drought in which the center couldn’t find the back of the net, though he did record three assists during that goalless stretch.

“I dont see a trend, ” Boucher said.

“You want to keep your timeouts”. Daley capped the day off with goal No. 7 for the Penguins at 8:49 in the final frame. “When I saw where the game was going, he didn’t have to live that”, said Boucher. “As I’ve said all along here, this group has a knack for responding the right way to any of the adversities or the challenges that this team has been faced with”.

Stone says the Penguins’ power play, which went 3-for-3 in Sunday’s 7-0 romp in Pittsburgh, is a case in point. But that wasn’t the biggest issue on this day.

He would spend the majority of his career with San Jose before getting dealt out this past year, moving to the Senators in a swap that sent Zack Stortini, Buddy Robinson and a seventh-round pick to the Bay Area. Carter Rowney, who’s been making a more noticeable impact over the past few games, took the original shot, picked up his own rebound and tossed it out to Bonino, who fired the puck off Rust and into the net.

Anderson, who was playing on his 36th birthday, gave up one more before the first intermission, on Wilson’s sharp-angle shot at 18:17 for a 4-0 Pittsburgh lead. In their Game 4 loss at Madison Square Garden, the Senators pulled a shaky Craig Anderson and rested Erik Karlsson for the entire third period because the game was completely out of hand – a foreshadowing of what Boucher would once again do on Sunday afternoon in Pittsburgh during the blowout loss. Rust tipped Nick Bonino’s shot from the slot after the Penguins had poured it on in the Ottawa zone with only 3:56 left in the period.

First Phil Kessel scored a power play goal 50 seconds into the third period, somewhat reluctantly, before Trevor Daley scored another power play goal eight minutes later to make it seven goals.

It appeared it would be enough to put Pittsburgh away in regulation until Malkin redirected a Chris Kunitz shot between Anderson’s legs with 5:35 left in the third.

Frustrated by an inability to get anything by Ottawa’s Craig Anderson, cameras caught Kessel pounding his fists and ordering his teammates to look for him. That’s unacceptable if you’re [Senators’ coach] Guy Boucher.

Boucher has typically kept his team off the ice on off-days during the post-season, but opted for a half-hour practice ahead of Game 6 to help his team “refresh” and “reload” after one of the worst losses in team playoff history. “It’s not lack of preparation”.

“We’ve done a good job with different guys coming in and out of the lineup”, Penguins captain Sidney Crosby told reporters in Pittsburgh. Everybody knows that on the planet.

Reloading against an opponent vying for back-to-back Stanley Cups means reverting back to strengths of the club. “We know that tomorrow night’s going to be their best game, and it’s going to be our best as well”.