DETROIT — If the NHL was looking for a wild game and a thrilling U.S. showcase in prime time on NBC, it got its wish in Game 5 of the Stanley Cup Finals on Monday night — and this morning, too — at Joe Louis Arena.
The only drawbacks were that the Penguins’ series-extending 4-3 victory in triple overtime wreaked havoc with the local news and “The Tonight Show” schedule in much of the country — and pushed back bedtimes for many determined to stick with it to the end . . . bitter or otherwise.
The Penguins blew a 2-0 lead, fell behind 3-2, got Maxime Talbot’s tying goal with goalie Marc-Andre Fleury off for a sixth attacker with only 35 seconds remaining in regulation, and then stayed alive in the series on the strength of Petr Sykora’s power-play score at 9:57 of the third overtime.
Read that long sentence out loud. Fast. Take a deep breath. Then sit on the edge of your seat for another couple of hours.
That’s how the game, the fifth-longest in Stanley Cup Finals history, seemed. Fleury finished with a heroic 55 saves, and the Penguins cut Detroit’s lead in the series to 3-2.
“We get to live another day,” said Sykora, the veteran right winger who scored from the right circle 36 seconds after Detroit’s Jiri Hudler drew a double-minor for high-sticking and drawing blood from the Penguins’ Rob Scuderi. The much-maligned Evgeni Mal- kin passed out to Sykora from behind the net, and Sykora’s shot beat Chris Osgood to the glove side, finally ending the marathon.
“Nobody wanted to be done tonight,” Fleury said. “We all wanted to play another game. We just kept battling until the end.”
Said Pittsburgh coach Michel Therrien, “That was probably one of the best games for a long time. And it’s fun.”
So with Detroit poised for a celebration, the Stanley Cup left the building — and headed back to Pittsburgh, where Game 6 is set for Wednesday night at Mellon Arena.
All day in Detroit, the theme was that the Red Wings couldn’t get caught up in the area’s presumptuousness. As workers were dismantling barriers and grandstands on the Detroit River waterfront in the wake of Sunday’s spectacularly successful Red Bull Air Race, police and other security personnel were girding for the possible Cup celebration that night.
Perhaps the Wings might have been guilty of looking ahead and overlooking the likelihood that as overmatched as the young Penguins had looked in much of the series, they weren’t going to roll over (or whatever Penguins do). Or perhaps they were just victims of Fleury as Detroit rolled up a 58-32 advantage in shots on goal.
Marian Hossa and Adam Hall had the first-period goals for the Penguins before the Red Wings awakened. Darren Helm’s goal got the Wings on the scoreboard, and his shot went off the skate of a dropping Pittsburgh defenseman Scuderi and past Fleury at 2:54 of the second period.
Pavel Datsyuk redirected a slap pass from Henrik Zetterberg on a power play to tie it at 2-2 at 6:43 of the third, and then Detroit defenseman Brian Rafalski — the Michigan native finishing his first season with the Wings after signing as an unrestricted free agent — seemed to be set up for a storybook feat when his goal at 9:23 put Detroit ahead 3-2.
But the Penguins forced overtime when Talbot got the puck past Osgood on his second whack at it.
And it went on, with the unique drama of hockey’s overtime — it can end in the blink of an eye or the flick of a wrist, or it can continue until you start to wonder if it might endure past last call in every sports bar in North America — coming into play.
Terry Frei: 303-954-1895 or tfrei@denverpost.com
THREE STARS
1. Marc-Andre Fleury.
The Penguins goalie made 55 saves. Enough said.
2. Petr Sykora.
Veteran winger ended it. Finally.
3. Pavel Datsyuk.
Center scored the second Detroit goal.
KEY MOMENT
With goalie Marc-Andre Fleury off for a sixth attacker and the Pittsburgh net empty, the Penguins tied the game and forced overtime on Maxime Talbot’s goal with 35 seconds remaining in regulation. It was Talbot’s third and most important goal of the Stanley Cup playoffs.
Terry Frei, The Denver Post
WILD CARD
Super password.
One of the reasons there were many Pittsburgh fans in attendance at the three games in Detroit was that a Pittsburgh radio station revealed the password that enabled Red Wings’ season- ticket holders to purchase extra tickets online before they were available to the general public.
Pittsburgh and Detroit are about 280 miles apart.
No word yet if any of those fans were left over from the Steelers’ Super Bowl win over Seattle in Detroit two years ago.
