Four goal Okposo lead Isles past Pens
The Penguins were defeated by the New York Islanders on Friday Night thanks mostly to the top line efforts from the New York Islanders and in particular Kyle Okposo who had the first goal game for an Islander since Matt Moulson's four goals against the Dallas Stars in 2011.
The Penguins had started the game brightly racing into a 2-0 lead with both goals coming on the Powerplay from Crosby and Perron. Crosby also picked up a helper on Perron's goal with some great movement on the PP to open him up. On his own you can state that Crosby had a good game as he enjoyed scoring another goal late in the second period from a redirect off Martin to send Pittsburgh 3-2 up into the break. However, on a whole his line played quite poorly together and really you could make a statement that the only line that showed up was the second line of Spaling-Malkin-Bennett.
The first line was the dominant line and it showed with all being above 50% in Corsi and with an average of 63.8CF%. It was quite a visible display as well from Evgeni Malkin who had an assist but deserved much more through his dominant puck control and cycle control in the game. Bennett and Malkin have created excellent chemistry since they were thrown together so when Hornqvist comes back it will be interesting to see what Johnson does with the lines. My hope is that Perron switches to the Left wing with Kunitz taking the Left wing spot on Malkin's line.
Back to the game and it was evident that the speed was again taking its toll. The Islanders were not only quicker on their feet but also on the puck. Tavares enjoyed making Despres a statue on the Islander's first and for the rest of the game the Islanders seemed to frequently get to the puck first in and around the blue paint. The Penguins seem to often been matched well when playing the Islanders which is something that should give for another good play-off series should they meet.
Something that happened in the game that was disappointing was Steve Downie's penalty incident near the end of the game. With the game tied at 3-3 and 17:19 into the third period he took a needles penalty after slashing Brock Nelson. The Islanders promptly went on the Powerplay and scored 10 seconds in before finishing it with an EN. Downie has been great for us but needs to learn when to control his anger.
Overall a game in January won't matter too much but it is always nice to beat your current division rivals. Roll on Sunday against the in-form Rangers.
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