Penguins beat Ducks for 7th straight road win
Last Updated: Wednesday, November 4, 2009 | 1:24 AM ET
The Associated Press
Marc-Andre Fleury flopped around his crease, awkwardly stacked his pads and even got lucky when a couple of pucks hit him before he saw them. Sidney Crosby helped out by diving desperately into the net to block another shot during that frantic stretch of the final minutes.
Although the defending champion Penguins aren't exactly winning gracefully, they're still flawless outside of Pittsburgh.
Pascal Dupuis scored the go-ahead goal with 10:47 to play, and the Penguins tied an NHL record with their seventh straight road victory to open the season, as the Penguins beat the last-place Anaheim Ducks 4-3 on Tuesday night.
"The way we've gotten them hasn't been perfect," Pittsburgh coach Dan Bylsma said. "But we battle and block shots, and our goalie makes a big save. It hasn't been as pretty as some might like, but we keep working hard."
Michael Rupp, Kris Letang and Alex Goligoski also scored for the Penguins, who won in California for just the second time since January 1999 with two goals in the third period.
Fleury made 26 saves for the Penguins, who matched the seven season-opening road victories of the 1940 Toronto Maple Leafs, the 1985 Philadelphia Flyers and the 2005 Detroit Red Wings.
New Jersey also is 7-0 on the road so far this season.
Corey Perry scored two goals for the Ducks, who have lost six of seven.
The Ducks' slow start hasn't affected the talented young forward, who scored his 100th career goal while extending his six-game scoring streak and a career-best four-game goal streak.
Pittsburgh was winless in 14 of its last 15 games in California, but the champs have a momentum that not even the Golden State could crack. After winning 12 of their first 15 games this season, the Penguins visit Los Angeles on Thursday and San Jose on Saturday.
And Pittsburgh is even doing it all without injured star Evgeni Malkin and regulars Sergei Gonchar and Max Talbot.
"We're just trying to do our best, and we're adjusting to new things," Crosby said. "I think that it's difficult when you lose two guys [Malkin and Gonchar] like we've lost. We've just got to adjust and find ways to be successful."
Jonas Hiller stopped 23 shots and Saku Koivu scored his first goal since Oct. 6 for Anaheim, but Pittsburgh opened its four-game West Coast road trip by causing constant traffic in front of the Ducks' net.
Perhaps that's because the Ducks also played without defenceman James Wisniewski, who sat out the first game of a two-game suspension for a high hit on Phoenix captain Shane Doan last weekend.
Wisniewski has averaged nearly 25½ minutes per game for Anaheim this season.
Anaheim came agonizingly close to tying it on several occasions during a frantic three-minute stretch without a whistle in the closing moments, but Crosby dived into the crease to block one shot, and several others barely missed Fleury's net.
"It was very frustrating for the last four minutes," Perry said. "We had some great chances, but Fleury played well and stood on his head a couple of times. We're working hard, and if we keep playing the way we played tonight, we're going to get bounces and create chances for ourselves. Everybody in here is trying their hardest."
