NHL: Penguins defeat Panthers in Overtime

February 24, 2007

The Pittsburgh Penguins won an exciting game Friday in Miami, as they defeated the Florida Panthers.

The Penguins, just off of a 16 game winning streak after dropping one to the New York Islanders on Monday, had some goalie controversy as to who will start the game. Penguins coach Michel Therrien had said that he was unhappy with the play of goalie Marc-Andre Fleury against the Islanders. As a result of this, goalie Jocelyn Thibault got the nod to start for the Pens on Thursday. There was also a goalie problem for the Panthers, as Alex Auld (Panthers starting goalie) had suffered an injury in a previous game and was out for the night. Instead, they started the old veteran Ed Belfour, who did a good job, stoping the puck 39 of the 41 shots he faced, which is a solid outing for any goalie. But it would be Jocelyn Thibault who outdid him, stopping 32 of 33 shots on goal.

Goal scoring was rather low, though, with Jordan Staal (Powerplay) and Colby Armstrong (Game winner, Overtime) scoring for the Penguins and Juraj Kolník scoring for the Panthers. Assists were credited to Evgeni Malkin, Sidney Crosby, Maxime Talbot, and Ryan Whitney for the Pens and Chris Gratton and Bryan Allen for the Panthers. The Three Stars of the game were given to Colby Armstrong (First Star), Jocelyn Thibault (Second Star),and Ed Belfour (Third Star).

All in all, this game was well played and was a solid win for the streaking Penguins. Pittsburgh will travel across the state to face the surging Tampa Bay Lightning this Sunday.