Penguins Take Series Lead at Home

Another hard fought match between the Pittsburgh Penguins and Montreal Canadiens saw the favourites take Game Five of their second round series in a 2-1 win on Saturday night.  The Penguins didn't have an easy go of it, especially being outshot after the 1st period, where they had finished 1-0, but they scored another goal in the 2nd period, which gave them enough of a cushion to allow a late power play goal to the Canadiens and come away with a 3-2 series lead.

The series will now shift back to Montreal on Monday night and the Habs will try to send this game to a seventh game, which would be on Wednesday night.

In a tight scoring game like Saturday night was, there wasn't a great deal of points to be handed out, but it was Sergei Gonchar who led the way for the Penguins, scoring the eventual game-winner for the Pens and adding an assist for a 3-point night and the only other player to get multiple points was Marc-Andre Fleury, who picked up the win.

It's been a tightly-contested series, so the scoring is down as a whole, which has made it a very entertaining series to watch. Marc-Andre Fleury, who has 3 wins and a shutout, leads the series in points with 8 points, more than any scorer in the pool.

The Penguins also made a line-up change going into Game Five, as they decided to sit Alexei Ponikarovsky, who has seemingly fallen out of favour with the coaching staff.  He was reportedly taken off the power play units in Game Four and now has been demoted to the press box, where he'll likely stay for Game Six, given the result on Saturday night.  Ponikarovsky was thought to be a solid pick-up for the Penguins, who got him at the trade deadline from Toronto.  He was also taken seven times in the pool, so there was some thought that he might do well in these playoffs, playing with some of the best players in the league.