Boston Bruins defenseman Johnny Boychuk (55) is helped off the ice by teammates Chris Kelly (23) and Brian Rolston (12) after he was checked hard and went down in the third period of an NHL hockey game against the Pittsburgh Penguins in Boston, Tuesday, April 3, 2012. The Penguins won 5-3. (AP Photo/Elise Amendola)
Quick game summary
In the first period, Sidney Crosby and Paul Martin scored the first two goals of the game, giving the Penguins a 2-0 lead. Benoit Pouliot scored his 15th goal of the season on a great individual effort, making it 2-1. Pouliot tied his career-high with 15 goals.
In the second period, Milan Lucic scored his 25th goal of the season to tie the game 2-2, only 18 seconds into the period. James Neal scored a 5-on-3 power-play goal making it 3-2 Penguins as Daniel Paille (charging penalty) and Rich Peverley (high-sticking penalty) were in the box. Peverley was in the box for this fake high-sticking call. Letang sold that one and the refs bought it.
What an embarrassment to hockey. This is what hockey is turning into, a bunch of losers diving to draw penalties. If they keep calling these, more and more low-character guys are going to keep diving like Letang here. Letang please go play soccer. Can the NHL please start fining and/or suspending players for diving and faking injuries.
Kris Letang dives/fakes injury
After the Neal goal, behind the Bruins net, Neal pushed Johnny Boychuk into the boards but it didn't look like much, but Andrew Ference I don't think caught the whole push but he saw Boychuk down so he dropped the gloves with Neal and they had an ok spirited fight. Ference did a good job for the size difference between these two as Neal is 6'2" 208lbs and Ference is 5'11" 189lbs.
James Neal vs Andrew Ference
After the fight, Sidney Crosby scored again, a power-play goal, making it 4-2 Penguins.
In the third period, Arron Asham scored to make it 5-2. Later, Rich Peverley scored his 11th goal of the season, making it 5-3.
Johnny Boychuk was injured in the third period as he collided with Arron Asham. From the replay it looked close to a knee-on-knee hit. From the replay on NBC it looked like Boychuk's skate got caught in the ice as he made contact with Asham but I'm not sure. Either way it's a knee or ankle injury. I just hope he is ok and can play in the playoffs.
Marty Turco made 22 saves on 27 shots. Turco is now 2-2-0 with a 3.68 GAA and a .855 save percentage this season.
Game notes
Goalie Anton Khudobin was recalled from Providence (AHL) on Monday and served as the backup to Marty Turco in this game as Tim Thomas was scratched.
New Bruins defenseman Torey Krug made his NHL debut tonight. He had 18:18 of ice time, had 2 shots and 1 blocked shot.
Before the game, Tyler Seguin won the NESN Seventh Player Award.
Adam McQuaid's injury is getting better as his swollen eye is still healing.
Gregory Campbell returned to the lineup as Jordan Caron did not play because of flu-like symptoms. Greg Zanon was scratched and Joe Corvo was in the lineup.
The Bruins led the game in shots 29-27. The Penguins led the game in faceoff wins 31-29, hits 32-26 and blocked shots 18-6.
The Bruins went 0-for-1 on the power-play while the Penguins went 2-for-4.
Tyler Seguin led the Bruins with 5 shots.
Milan Lucic led the Bruins with 6 hits.
Onto the next one
The Bruins are now 47-29-4 with 98 points and have 2 games left in the season. The next game for the Bruins is on Thursday at the Ottawa Senators at 7:30pm ET. This will be a preview of the first round of the playoffs. I think we'll see Tim Thomas play in this game and have Anton Khudobin play the final game against the Buffalo Sabres.
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