Tonight marks the 3rd match-up of the year between these two opponents, and the third match up in a row vs a New York team. The last time these two teams met, Dustin Jeffrey came out to score the opening goal, and the Pens went on to win 5-2, completing their 12th straight win and extending the streak that eventually ended against the Isles the next game. Prior to that Fleury stopped all 30 shots against the Sabres in their first match up to record his first shutout of the season. Injuries and Goalie fights have been the hot topics recently, but I'd like to touch on a little gem that has been trying to gleam in the spotlight, Chris Kunitz.
Kunitz has almost silently been playing himself up to his best season of his career. Looking at 18 goals pacing 29 for the year, Kunitz has 2 goals in the previous two contests and also has goals in five of the previous 8 games. Kunitz has worked hard to provide offense for a team missing two of it's biggest playmakers. In the 5 games that Sid and Geno have both been out of the line up, Kunitz has 4 points (2g 2a) leading the team in scoring when the superstars aren't shining. Four seems to be a good number for Kunitz, as he ranks fourth on the team in total points (18g 18a), and fourth on the team in hits with 112. Here's hoping he can keep the offense going and generate some more scoring chances now that Malkin is back on the ice.
Another interesting storyline is the possible line up combination of Eric Tangradi - Dustin Jeffrey - Chris Conner, aka the Wilkes-Barre Scranton line which came up during practice. The three found that they gelled really well still and had a lot of good things going for them during practice. If this line makes an appearance tonight, with the WBS boys coming out and contributing like they usually do, it should make for an interesting look at the future of the Penguins. Look for Tangradi to be doing big things, and hopefully tallying a point in this game unlike his game against the Isles on Wednesday evening.
Buffalo hasn't played a game in 10 days, so they've been resting and practicing. The Penguins players don't feel like the Sabres are going to come out rusty however and have prepared for a high energy team. Here are some of the players comments about the game against Buffalo:
Marc Andre Fleury; "They have a good goalie to start with, so that always makes it hard on us. But as a team, they play hard and play an intense game. For 60 minutes you can count on them to be in there. It’s always a hard-fought game. There are never any easy points there."
Paul Martin; "They’ve had good games but we’ve been able to get the puck in deep behind their net. Our forwards have done a good job of finding ways to create opportunities. The last game we were able to get a couple goals early, so that helped."
Eric Tangradi, when commenting about the WBS line;"Dustin came up to me at the end of the skate and said it’s the WBS Penguins line. We’ll see how it goes. We have a lot of chemistry and we’ve all played with each other at some point, so it was nice to get out there with them."
Projected line ups aren't set in stone like always but here is what you can expect from the Penguins:
Chris Kunitz - Evgeni Malkin - Pascal Dupuis
Matt Cooke - Jordan Staal - Tyler Kennedy
Mike Rupp - Maxime Talbot - Craig Adams
Eric Tangradi - Dustin Jeffrey - Chris Conner
Marc Andre Fleury will be in between the pipes tonight for the Pens.
The Penguins are on a 4 game winning streak going into this game. Don't forget to bring and waive that Terrible Towel with pride if you're going to the game tonight.
Lets go Pens!
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