Penguins' Crosby finds net twice to tie Lightning's Stamkos for goal-scoring title
-
Sidney Crosby scored two goals, his 50th and 51st, in the Penguins' overtime victory Sunday. -
Jordan Staal, left, and Jordan Leopold celebrate Leopold's overtime goal against the Islanders Sunday.
Share with others:
UNIONDALE, N.Y. -- Sidney Crosby knew going in that he couldn't do the impossible.
That no matter what he accomplished in the Penguins' final regular-season game, he couldn't make them win the Atlantic Division title, or raise them above the No. 4 seed in the Eastern Conference playoffs.
So he settled for trying to pull off the utterly improbable -- and almost made it happen.
Things didn't quite work out the way he hoped -- his five-point effort in the Penguins' 6-5 overtime victory against the New York Islanders Sunday evening at Nassau Coliseum wasn't quite enough to overtake Vancouver's Henrik Sedin in the NHL scoring race -- but he got a nice consolation prize: A share of the Rocket Richard Trophy as the league's top-goal scorer.
Crosby scored two goals against New York to run his total to 51, and came within 13 seconds of having the Richard to himself. Steve Stamkos of Tampa Bay, however, hit an empty net as time was winding down in the Lightning's 3-1 victory at Florida to match Crosby's output.
PDF"I never was one for ties, but I'll accept a tie, I guess," Crosby said. "It's not easy to score in this league, at all. Steven had a great season."
And if Crosby was upset that Stamkos caught him with an empty-netter, he wasn't letting on.
"It doesn't make it any easier [to accept], but they all count," he said. "That's the way it is."
Crosby is the eighth Penguin to score 50 or more goals in a season, and the first to win the Richard since it was introduced in 1999.
Word of Stamkos' goal made it from the press box to the Penguins' bench early in the third period, and coach Dan Bylsma tried to get Crosby into positions where he could get No. 52 as regulation wound down.
"We were definitely trying to get him in a situation where he'd be able to try to get that goal," he said.
It didn't work out, though, and the Penguins' final goal -- the only one in which Crosby did not play a part -- was scored by defenseman Jordan Leopold with 34.4 seconds left in overtime.
That goal spared the Penguins the embarrassment of losing a game in which they had a 5-2 lead against a non-playoff team with less than 16 minutes left in regulation.
First Published April 12, 2010 12:00 am
