Dan Muse hasn\u2019t reacted via lineup changes to losses very frequently this season, however today changes on that front. All three of the top lines are mixed up a bit, Anthony Mantha moves up to the top line, Ben Kindel and Tommy Novak join Justin Brazeau on a new-look line, and perhaps most inexplicably of all Kevin Hayes is going to center Evgeni Malkin and Yegor Chinakhov. It\u2019s the type of lineup that works and Muse looks smart, or it doesn\u2019t and a lot of people will be questioning. Connor Clifton is back for his first game since December 20th and only his second since 12\/14 after a long streak of healthy scratches.<\/p>\n
The home Bruins are going with these lines and backup goalie Joonas Korpisalo on the back-half of their b2b.<\/p>\n
Tommy Novak goes to the box early. Boston appears to score later on but after further review Sean Kuraly punched the puck in with his glove and that isn\u2019t allowed. No goal after all.<\/p>\n
Brazeau takes a penalty, Pittsburgh kills it off without much trouble. Soon after, the Bruins score a good goal. Viktor Arvidsson chops a backhander while not even facing the net after a scramble that slips under Stuart Skinner.<\/p>\n
The period comes to a close much like it did throughout; with a Penguin in the penalty box. This time Evgeni Malkin for high-sticking. Pittsburgh again stays strong down a player.<\/p>\n
Decent first but the Pens were in penalty trouble too much and couldn\u2019t get off to the start they were looking for. 1-0 Boston after one with an even 10 shots for each side.<\/p>\n
Pittsburgh kills off the short carryover and gets a few looks at the Boston net but can\u2019t beat Korpisalo. Kulak bobbles the puck and play goes the other way, Kulak has to hook Mark Kastelic to obstruct the breakaway and it\u2019s yet another Penguin penalty to kill off, which they do.<\/p>\n
The frequent trips to the penalty box continues, Kulak flipped the puck over the glass for the delay of game call with another job well done for the Pittsburgh PK.<\/p>\n
The worm turns, Kastelic is given goalie interference penalty. Kastelic is none too pleased with Skinner for falling back in animated manner but given the situation it was bound to happen for the Penguins to finally get a shot with their power play for the first time on the night. It barely gets setup, though Brazeau does ring a deflected shot off the post shortly after the power play expires.<\/p>\n
Both teams trade chances in the late stages, Sidney Crosby puts a couple of nice backhand shots that Korpisalo is right there to match.<\/p>\n
Still 1-0 Boston with Pittsburgh either getting in their own way or failing to get a lot going through 40 minutes.<\/p>\n
Brazeau is back to the penalty box early on, lucky for him the Bruins take a penalty 30 seconds into their power play to negate it.<\/p>\n
The rest of the period trickles away without much going on. Pittsburgh pulls Skinner with about two minutes to go, they use the time with 1:24 remaining to regroup and give a breather. Doesn\u2019t help and time ticks to 0:00 without the Pens finding a goal today.<\/p>\n
The Pens will head back home and try to shake off the doldrums they find themselves going through right now. They\u2019ll likely need to do so soon since the mighty Tampa Bay Lightning are up next.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dan Muse hasn\u2019t reacted via lineup changes to losses very frequently this season, however today changes on that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":402646,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[111671,385,99],"class_list":{"0":"post-402645","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-game-recaps","9":"tag-nhl","10":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/402645","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=402645"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/402645\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/402646"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=402645"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=402645"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=402645"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}