Brad Thiessen plays arguably the best game of his career and possibly the best game a goaltender wearing a Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins uniform ever has. Thiessen stopped 46 of 47 shots he faced tonight, including 20 in the third period alone.
"I couldn't do that on my own," Thiessen said, adding that he was repeating a bible verse over and over in his head. "It was fun to be a part of and I am just happy to give our team a chance and bring it to a Game Seven."
Trevor Smith scores 3:26 in to overtime to win it for the Penguins and force a Game Seven after the Pens had trailed the series 3-0. The Penguins are just the 4th team in the history of the American Hockey League to force a Game Seven after falling behind 3-0.
After the game Smith was quick to credit the first star of the game to Thiessen.
"He's got that skill," Smith said of Thiessen. "We leaned on him hard tonight and you know what, the last couple games we have too. He took the game over for us. He bailed us out. He's first star tonight and for most of the series."
Alex Grant has to feel like he redeemed himself tonight after a tough break for him in Game Three. Tonight, the bounce went his way. Grant took a shot from the point and though it didn't go on net, he got it through traffic and behind the net. The puck came off the back wall right to Trevor Smith, who said he got it on his backhand and thought the puck hit off something before it went in.
Whether it went in off a skate, a stick or a body the Penguins found a way to win and gave themselves a chance to play in a winner-take-all Game Seven Wednesday night in Providence.
More after the jump.
The Penguins got off to a good start tonight. They were unable to score on their lone power play chance of the period, and the Bruins gained momentum from that which led to some late period penalties.
The Bruins picked up the pace to start the second period and took the lead on a bad WBS line change
1:07 into the middle frame. Chris Bourque stole a clearing attempt and got the puck ahead to Jamie Tardif, who chipped it over a Penguins defenseman to Carter Cunningham. Cunningham one touched a puck past Thiessen to give the Bruins the 1-0 lead.
Brian Dumoulin tied the game at one with the Penguins on a 5-on-3 power play. Derek Nesbitt got a puck back to the point to Dumoulin, who fired a wrist shot wired to the top shelf. Svedberg was late to reacting to the point shot through traffic and it picked the corner.
From there the Bruins continued to pressure the Penguins, but Brad Thiessen was equal to the task, stopping 12 of the 13 shots he faced in the 2nd period. The Penguins took a late period penalty and started the third period shorthanded.
It was the Brad Thiessen show in the third period, as the Penguins were outshot 21-2 in the final period. Luckily for the Penguins, Thiessen stopped all 21 shots he faced in the period, making several big saves to keep the game tied at one.
ROSTER NOTES
Dylan Reese, who hadn't played since Game One of this series, returned to the lineup tonight for Game Six. He replaced the injured Bobby Farnham, leaving the Penguins with 11 forwards and seven defenseman in the lineup.
Nesbitt-Smith-Kolarik
Collins-Gibbons-Thompson
Holzapfel-Peters-Payerl
Sill - Megna
Dumoulin-Samuelsson
Mormina-Merth
Grant-McNeill
Reese
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
0 comments:
Post a Comment