The Pittsburgh Penguins will look to avoid a 3-0 series deficit when they take on the Boston Bruins in Game 3 of the Eastern Conference Finals on Wednesday.
The Penguins were beaten 3-0 in Game 1, but were thoroughly dominated 6-1 in the second game. The team gave up a goal in the first minute and saw goaltender Thomas Vokoun's night end late in the first when the score reached 3-0. The Penguins earned a late goal from Brandon Sutter, but gave up a goal just 24 seconds later to restore Boston's three goal lead.
"It's not a feeling where we want to be, but we have a lot of experience in the room and I know a lot of the guys have been down and won a series before," goaltender Marc Andre Fleury said. "So we'll just put those two behind us and make sure we get back to our game."
"As a group, we need to be a lot better," added Penguins coach Dan Bylsma. "We need to get to our foundation of how we play and play as a group, and we didn't do that. That includes every one of them, all of us, not just 87 [Crosby], 71 [Malkin] and 58 [Letang]."
Goalie Tuuka Rask made 26 stops in the game and has conceded once in the last two games.
"We pretty much dominated that game," Rask said. "Our defense was really good not giving them too many scoring chances at all."
Despite the tremendous performance, the team knows that things could go wrong in a hurry. Boston blew a 3-1 series lead against the Toronto Maple Leafs in the opening round and nearly lost Game 7 on home ice.
"You can't be satisfied with what you've done," said Boston forward Milan Lucic. "It's a big two wins, but two wins is just two wins. There's still a long way to go and they have more than enough character in that room to fight their way back."
Prediction: Pittsburgh earns a 4-2 win.
Start Time: 8 PM EST
TV: NBCSN, CBC, RDS