from Ron Cook of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette,
It was a little of the best of Evgeni Malkin. He had two assists — the second a tremendous pass — in what amounted to a season-sustaining 4-2 win for the Penguins on Sunday night against the Philadelphia Flyers. That gave him 80 points for the season, a number he has hit six times during his Hall of Fame-caliber career.
It also was a lot of the worst of Malkin. He took not one, not two, not three, but four minor penalties. He topped off the fourth — for unsportsmanlike conduct — early in the third period with a 10-minute misconduct and then a 10-minute game misconduct for, presumably, yelling obscenities in English or Russian or maybe both at referee Chris Schlenker with increasing fury. Malkin is not the Penguins’ all-time leader in penalty minutes for nothing. You can add 28 minutes to his career number.
Mike Sullivan loves the good Malkin. He has talked about him frequently, with complete justification, as being “a generational talent.” Malkin showed his elite ability on his second assist, faking a shot before setting up Rickard Rakell for the goal that gave the Penguins a 2-0 lead. Malkin has just two goals in his past 18 games, but his playmaking has been brilliant, with 16 assists in those games. He has 80 points in 77 games this season, a nice 1.04 points-per-game average that is especially impressive for a player, 36, with plenty of wear and tear on his body.
But Sullivan doesn’t care much for the bad Malkin. He clearly wasn’t happy, again with complete justification, by what happened Sunday night.
continued
We cant ever forget the NHL overturning its own rules in the middle of the 2009 Stanley Cup Finals to permit Malkin to continue playing when he should have been suspended after Game 2 for instigating a fight on Zetterberg for the purpose of retribution, one of the defined actions requiring suspension of one game. With Detroit leading two games to zero that likely would have cinched the Finals and another back to back for Detroit, which just couldnt be allowed to happen.
Yep. They lost game 3, 3-2, with Malkin assisting on all three *hitsburgh goals. Of course add in Pittsburgh having an extra player on the ice for over 20 seconds with no penalty called. Swung the series like Bettman hoped his interference in it would work.
all the teams know you can get under his skin and take him off his game - which is a considerable HOF type of game. He is a great talent. But don't forget Kris Letang - he is much easier to antagonize than even Malkin. another EXCELLENT player who takes dumb penalties and can cost his team games
Create an Account
In order to leave a comment, please create an account.