25th goal of the season, 660th transmission in his career and first star of the match: Malkin helped Pittsburgh win 40th victory in the NHL

Duel of Malkin and Gusev

“Pittsburgh” interrupted an unsuccessful series of two losses in a row and won the 40th victory of the season. Mike Sullivan’s wards defeated rivals from New Jersey on the road, and the focus was on the confrontation between Russian players. Evgeni Malkin chalked up three productive actions, and Nikita Gusev noted an abandoned puck.

Events developed rapidly, and already in the first 13 minutes the teams exchanged accurate hits. Evan Rodriguez scored among the guests, and Gusev among the hosts. The Russian striker took part in the implementation of the numerical majority and left Matt Murray out of business. Hockey players of the Devils organized a combination with the entrance to the opponent’s zone, and Nikita calmly completed the attack with the help of a hand throw. For him, this goal was 13th in the season, which allowed him to approach the rank of the third best sniper team. At the moment, this line is occupied by Nico Hishir (14), and the leader is Kyle Palmieri (25).

At the same time, in the scorer race, the Russian took second place and came close to Palmieri. Gusev’s track record has 44 points, and the American surpasses him by only one point. The closest of the pursuers is Hishir.

But, if Gusev received the title of second star, then his compatriot Malkin became the first. At the beginning of the second segment, the Russian leader “Penguins” brought Justin Schulz to a clean throw and scored a 660 pass in his career, and in the middle of the third he twice upset Mackenzie Blackwood. Moreover, the interval between the two goals of Eugene was only 6 minutes 7 seconds. First, he distinguished himself from the blue line after a solo passage, and then he played great at the interception and “shot” the Devils goalkeeper.

Malkin for the tenth time in his career scored at least 25 goals in a season and approached the title of Pittsburgh's best sniper. This season, only Brian Rast more often hit the opponents' goal, scoring twice as much. As for the scorers rating, with 74 points Eugene is the sole leader of the team in this indicator and takes 14th place in the league. The same number of effective actions on the account of the Rangers striker Mika Zibanezhad and only one more for the defender of “Washington” John Carlson.

It is worth noting that this mark was submitted to Malkin for 55 games, which is much less than that of his competitors. So, by the number of points per game (1.35), he came out in sixth place in the NHL, if you count the players who played at least 30 matches per season. Above him, only the leaders of the championship in the person of McKinnon, Pasternyak, Panarin, McDavid and Dreisaitl.

The success of Panarin and the achievement of Shesterkin

The meeting between Dallas and the Rangers could also be seen in the context of the confrontation between Russian legionnaires, but in recent days their number has slightly decreased. So, the second game in a row was missed by the forward of the hosts Alexander Radulov - he was placed on the list of injured and could not help his partners even in a duel with Nashville. After he returned to duty, but trained separately from the team and did not participate in the next match.

In his absence, Denis Guryanov could not help the hosts to interrupt a series of five failures in a row and to oppose something to Artemy Panarin and the company. The guests confidently prevailed, and domestic hockey players took an active part in this.

Already at the 19th second, the blue shirts came forward, and their leader demonstrated the skills of the dispatcher. Panarin dragged the puck on the left and led to the throw of Adam Fox. The defender had only to hammer it into the net. Artemia had 94 (32 + 62) points, which allowed him to get around Nathan McKinnon from Colorado and climb up to a clean fourth in the race for the Art Ross Trophy. In total, David Pastarniak from Boston is ahead of the score, and Connor McDavid from Edmonton is two points ahead of him. The leader of the Canadian partner is Leon Dreisaitl with 110 (43 + 67) points.

Almost ten minutes later, the Rangers doubled the lead, and Pavel Buchnevich acted as an assistant. He took part in the combination, which ended with an accurate throw of Zibanezhad and scored 45 (15 + 30) points, which helped him to catch up with Chris Krider. The American was in fourth place on the team’s top scorers, but was injured at the end of February and dropped out for at least a month.

Subsequently, the double Kaapo Kakko helped the Rangers lead with a difference of four goals, but in the end the Stars were able to reduce the backlog by the efforts of Rup Hintz and Andrew Cogliano. But even this did not greatly spoil the statistics of Igor Shesterkin. The Russian made 31 saves and became the sixth goalkeeper in league history, scoring ten victories in his first 12 matches. Before him, Frank Brimsek, Wayne Thomas, Bob Froz, Bob Mason and Frederick Andersen succeeded.

Passes of Kucherov and Svechnikov

Tampa Bay for the second time this season could not cope with Toronto and extended the unbeaten streak to two meetings in a row. The teams delighted the audience with only three accurate throws, two of which were delivered on goal. At the same time, Nikita Kucherov scored in the fourth match in a row, and Andrei Vasilevsky became one of the main characters of the confrontation.

The Russian goalkeeper saved his goal 34 times and, by and large, was not guilty of any of the two goals conceded. If William Nyulander "shot" him with a nickle, then Oston Matthews - after a cutting transmission along the alignment. At the same time, each of them could well take a double, but Vasilevsky was noted by a number of bright saves.

As for Kucherov, it was he who became one of the main characters in the only successful attack of the guests. The Russian supported the race of Braden Point and shot on goal Andersen. He managed, but Ondrej Chambers arrived in time for finishing. In Nikita's piggy bank there were 85 (33 + 52) points, which allowed him to gain a foothold in seventh place in the scorers race. Two points more for striker “Boston” Brad Marchand.

This day also became successful for Andrei Svechnikov. The Carolina striker scored a transfer in a meeting with Detroit's main league outsider and continued to fight for the team leader by points. At the moment, he is on the third line with 61 (24 + 37) points and second only to Teivo Teryaväinen (15 + 48) and Sebastian Aho (38 + 28).

The Russian appeared on the ice in the special brigade of the majority and took a favorite position outside the gate, after which he brought Justin Williams to the throw. The 38-year-old veteran did not miss a touch and closed the transfer of Svechnikov. This goal helped Hurricanes go ahead with the score 3: 2, and in the remaining time the double Aho strengthened the advantage of the guests.