Penguins, Canadiens in Game 7 showdown

Associated Press

PITTSBURGH

Improbable as it might seem, the Montreal Canadiens are playing a Game 7. Again.

As unlikely a Game 7 as that against the Washington Capitals a couple of weeks ago? Maybe. As unlikely a Game 7 as the Pittsburgh Penguins have played in the last 14 seasons? Maybe that, too.

All the Canadiens know is this: They barely made it into the playoffs, but they’ve taken the reigning Stanley Cup champions to the last game, just as they did the NHL regular season champion Capitals.

As the Capitals found out, anything can happen in a Game 7 — even the unimaginable.

“Game 7, it’s all about passion, details, and the team that’s going to want the game the most is going to win,” Canadiens forward Maxim Lapierre said.

Two other heavily favored Penguins teams discovered that during Game 7 losses at home, against the Panthers (1996) and Islanders (1993). Each time, the Penguins led 3-2 in the series — as they did in this one — only to allow a team with nothing to lose the chance to play an elimination game.

The top-seeded Capitals led the eighth-seeded Canadiens 3-1 in the first round, but lost Game 7 by 2-1 as Montreal completed one of the NHL’s biggest playoff series upsets in decades.

“This is a challenge for us,” Penguins captain Sidney Crosby said Tuesday, barely 12 hours after the Penguins returned from their 4-3 loss in Game 6 in Montreal. “It’s 3-3. There are some views out there this should have been an easy series. But we’re not losing. It’s tied. They’re here.”

That is the surprise — the Canadiens, who finished with 33 points fewer than the Capitals and 13 fewer than the Penguins are still here, 14 games after sneaking into the Eastern Conference playoffs by one point.

Their goalie, Jaroslav Halak, has outplayed Stanley Cup winner Marc-Andre Fleury. Their leading scorer, Mike Cammalleri, has six goals to one each for Penguins stars Crosby and Evgeni Malkin. Nothing is going as expected in a series that Pittsburgh looked ready to dominate after winning 6-3 in Game 1.

“It’s pretty good when people don’t believe in you,” Lapierre said. “You get a special boost, a special energy, and we’re so tight in here because nobody believed in us. It doesn’t matter the way we got into the playoffs. It’s a new season and the job is not done. We’ve got to win Game 7.”

Accomplishing that likely will require Montreal to find a way to control Crosby — a finalist for the league MVP award — for one more game.

Crosby had 14 points in six games against Ottawa in the opening round, but has five points — four assists — in six games against Montreal. His only goal came Monday, when Montreal played without top-line defenseman Hal Gill (leg injury). Gill’s status for Game 7 won’t be decided until today, according to coach Jacques Martin.

With Gill out, defenseman Jaroslav Spacek returned after missing nine games with an illness and contributed what proved to be the decisive goal. Cammalleri also scored twice more, giving him a playoff-leading 11 goals in two rounds.

The Penguins figure to be plenty desperate. A loss not only would end a season in which they were expected to make another run at the Stanley Cup, it would be their final home game in 49-year-old Mellon Arena. They will move into a new arena next season.

Their first game in what was known then as the Civic Arena? A 2-1 loss to Montreal on Oct. 11, 1967.