NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Sidney Crosby has been bringing the Stanley Cup back home to Pittsburgh to get another consecutive year. He is bringing another MVP trophy, also.
Patric Hornqvist scored with 1:35 left and Matt Murray made 27 saves for his second straight shutout as the Penguins became the first team in nearly two decades to repeat as winner with a 2-0 win over the Nashville Predators in Game 6 on Sunday night.
The Penguins won their fifth title — all of these clinched on the street — to tie the Wayne Gretzky-Mark Messier-era Edmonton Oilers for sixth on the all time record. The Detroit Red Wings in 1997 and’98 were the last winner to defend their name. The Penguins are the first to do it in the era.
“We knew it was going to be tough all year, but we just tried to keep with it,” Crosby said. “We had a lot of accidents and things like this. We just kept discovering ways. That was actually what we did all year long, all playoffs. It is great to have the ability to do it.”
Crosby also became only the third player to win the Conn Smythe Trophy in consecutive years since the Stanley Cup MVP to move along with his third championship. He headed the Closing in scoring with one goal and six assists, including three in a 6-0 win in Game 5 which put the Penguins on the doorstep of some other title. Only teammate Evgeni Malkin (28 points) had over Crosby’s 27 this postseason.
“You have a little window to play and have a profession,” Crosby said. “I feel blessed, but I also know how hard it had been you only want to try to make the very best of it.”
Hornqvist scored off Nashville goalie Pekka Rinne’s left elbow, the former Predator silencing the raucous crowd that had stood for extended minutes and flung a few more catfish, too. Nashville challenged for goalie interference, but the target was upheld. Together with Pekka Rinne pulled for an extra attacker, Carl Hagelin set off a bench celebration with an empty netter with 13.6 seconds left.
“Obviously, it’s going to be the biggest goal I am going to score,” Hornqvist said. “That is going to stand very close to my heart.”
All that was left was that the celebrating. Crosby took the Cup from NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman before committing off the trophy to veteran defenseman Ron Hainsey who passed it to veteran forward Matt Cullen.
Nashville lost for only the first time in law on home ice this postseason and this one had some tough luck. Colton Sissons had a target erased by a whistle 67 seconds into the second period. The Predators went of 4 with the man advantage, for example 32 minutes of a 5-on-3 in the third.
“It stings,” said defenseman P.K. Subban, brought within a trade stunner from the offseason and a foil for Crosby all series. “I think the biggest thing we’ve got to take from this is, don’t forget the sensation. That is what’s going to drive us. …. We’re going to be back here again next year”
Forget a golden anniversary: The Penguins will cap their 50th year with their names on the most famous silver cup in sport . It’s also the third tournament for Crosby and a small number of teammates from the 2009 title team, surpassing both won from the Penguins teams headed by current owner Mario Lemieux in the 1990s.
And it’s the next championship in 18 months for trainer Mike Sullivan, who’s yet to lose a playoff series since taking more than Mike Johnston has been terminated. Sullivan is your first American-born coach to win the Cup not once, but twice.
“It’s been an wonderful year from the start, trying to replicate,” Lemieux said. “A lot of these guys played injured in the playoffs and revealed a lot of character. Obviously, Sid being the best player on earth again and again winning the Conn Smythe. He was our chief and picked up the team when we needed it”
Murray became the first goalie to win not one, but two Stanley Cups as a rookie after being a late-season call up a year ago who didn’t play enough matches to get that label eliminated. That is something Patrick Roy, Ken Dryden or Cam Ward ever managed, but the 23-year-old Murray finished this Closing shutting out Nashville to the final 146:52. He set a rookie record with two shutouts at the Final.
“What an experience,” he explained. “It will not get any better”
The loss ended the upstart Predators’ deepest playoff series in their 19-year background and one that became the talk of town — and the league.
Having won just three of 12 playoff series earlier this year, Nashville opened this postseason by eliminating the top-seeded Chicago Blackhawks in four matches. In doing this, the Predators became the primary eighth-seeded group to sweep a first-round series because the current playoff format was first released in 1994. Nashville went through St. Louis and Anaheim into the Final, where just captain Mike Fisher about the roster had ever played .
The stingy Predators discovered Pittsburgh was up to the task, together with the Penguins taking the first two games at home ice. Nashville roared back in your home to even things up, however, the Penguins hauled Nashville to install Game 6.
The Penguins destroyed Nashville’s large party on the last night of CMA Music Festival, which brought more than 100,000 to downtown Nashville. Country celebrity Luke Bryan serenaded fans out of the rooftop of a honky-tonk at a performance which kicked off the tv broadcast, and he also staged a four-song place for fans inside and outside the arena an hour before face-off.
Religion Hill became the newest to sing the national anthem with husband, star Tim McGraw, giving her a hug once completed before putting a towel in each hand. At least five catfish hit the ice before the face-off.
Then a series that hadn’t featured a single one-goal game went scoreless through the first 58 minutes. The Predators thought they had the first goal of the match, just as they did in Game 1 in Pittsburgh, simply to have referee Kevin Pollock tide it off instantly. He had whistled the play dead when he lost sight of the puck with Murray about the ice between him and the puck.
Sissons tapped the puck to the web 67 seconds into the second time behind Murray’s back. Officials huddled, however, the goal was not allowed.
Murray also stopped Sissons on a breakaway midway through the second and also gloved a shot out of Viktor Arvidsson afterwards in the period. The Penguins also killed off 32 minutes of a 5-on-3 at 8:47 of the next after Trevor Daley hit Ryan Ellis with Olli Maatta currently in the box for tripping. Murray made a huge stop on a shot by Mattias Ekholm followed with a save on Arvidsson.
“We never gave up,” Fisher stated. “We dropped a great deal of guys to injuries. Sixteen seed. No one really gave us a chance against anybody and here we’re in Game 6. Things didn’t go our way, but that occurs. That is sport. Like I said, this team never gave up. We thought all the way.”
This championship season for the Penguins lacked a number of the play from one year before, but it was far from a slam dunk. Washington won the President’s Trophy for a second straight season and pushed Pittsburgh to seven matches in the next round. Ottawa did the exact same thing, forcing the Penguins to double overtime to clinch the Eastern Conference title.
Crosby, Malkin and others played in the World Cup of Hockey before the season, which makes this an even longer year than normal. In the end, the Penguins had more than enough in the tank to bring home another name.
“We’ve got a selection of men who know what it takes to acquire,” Crosby said.
Notes
Lemieux won the Conn Smythe in 1992 and 1992, and Bernie Parent was the first to win the MVP trophy in consecutive years in 1974 and 1975. … Murray is the primary goalie with 2 shutouts in a single Cup Final because Boston’s Tim Thomas and Vancouver’s Roberto Luongo had two apiece in 2011. … Nashville finished the show going 0 on the power play over the final two matches. … Grammy winners Cage the Elephant performed during the second intermission after playing at Bonnaroo on Friday night.
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