New York Islanders grab third straight over Pittsburgh Penguins 5-3 -NHL Update
New York is playing amazingly well, but unfortunately, at the wrong time in the season as Islanders grabbed their third straight victory and fifth of the past six, this time against Pittsburgh Penguins, 5-3, Thursday night, March 29, 2012, at the Nassau
Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Uniondale, New York.
It was not only New York’s third consecutive win, but also second straight over Pittsburgh Penguins as the two teams met on Tuesday and now again in which Islanders dominated both times 5-3.
Marty Reasoner kicked off the scoring with his first of the 2011-2012 National Hockey League (NHL) regular season at the 11:07 mark of the opening period.
Pascal Dupuis added the equaliser at a time when Pittsburgh was shorthanded with Simon Despres out for hooking with a minor penalty.
Kyle Okposo fired off on the power play, giving New York the lead yet again and Josh Bailey widened the gap while Islanders were down a player with Matt Martin on the benches for boarding.
Bailey played amazingly well and made it his biggest career game in four years of playing as he picked up five points (2 goals, 3 assists), becoming the first Islanders player to have done so ever since Niklas Andersson did back in December of 1996.
"As a line I thought we played pretty well and found a way to get some goals," Bailey said. "It's resulted in our team getting a couple of extra wins and takes some pressure off the top line."
Okposo also had his first 20 goal season this year, showing that the Islanders do not have plans of giving up until the final game even though being ousted from the playoff race.
"We always play to win, no matter where we are in the standings," said Okposo. "We always play with pride. I think the last two games definitely showed that."
In what could have been a serious incident, Pittsburgh captain and superstar player, Sidney Crosby, was struck in the face by the puck on a shot, leaving him bloodied and forcing to leave the game during the second period. Luckily, he did not need stitches
and will be back to playing.
"We didn't do a lot of good things and we paid for it again," Crosby said. "We made some mistakes and they capitalized on it."
Kyle Okposo and Josh Bailey added two more for New York in the third with Pittsburgh being denied the comeback despite two of their own from Jordan Staal and Evgeni Malkin.
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