"The fifth one was tough" - Sidney Crosby opens up about factors behind Penguins loss to the Bruins 

By ARJUN B

Modified Apr 14, 2024 11:31 GMT

The Pittsburgh Penguins saw their 10-game point streak snapped on Saturday night as they fell 6-4 to the Boston Bruins. In a post-game interview, team captain Sidney Crosby opened up about the factors behind the defeat.

"You don’t want to give up that fourth one we did shorthanded, but OC got us a big one there, gave us a lot of momentum. I think the fifth one was tough. They got a lot of momentum when they got that fifth one. But I felt like we were in it all night," Crosby said.

The Bruins opened a 2-0 lead in the second period with goals from Jake DeBrusk and Pavel Zacha, scored just 14 seconds apart, the latter marking Zacha's 20th goal of the season.

The Penguins cut the deficit when Bryan Rust scored his 28th goal for the season, but Erik Shattenkirk soon increased Boston's lead again.

After a goalie (Alex Nedeljkovic) change, the Penguins' Tristan Jarry conceded a shorthanded goal to Brad Marchand, making it 4-1.

However, Michael Bunting and Drew O'Connor brought Pittsburgh closer with a power-play goal and a shorthanded goal, respectively.

The Bruins widened the gap again with Seth Geekie's goal, assisted by Derek Forbort. Danton Heinen scored into an empty net, and despite Bunting's second goal of the night, the Bruins secured a 6-4 victory over the Penguins.

“We scored enough to win,” Crosby said. “It was just a matter of limiting their chances. We gave them some time and space and they have some skilled guys that will make you pay and they did that tonight.”

The loss drops the Penguins out of a playoff spot in the tight Eastern Conference wild-card race. They now trail the Washington Capitals, Detroit Red Wings and Philadelphia Flyers by a point for the final spot. Crosby also spoke about wanting his team to shrug themselves off from this defeat quickly, while also learning from their mistakes.

"We’ve been playing this type of hockey for a while now and we’ve had to put games behind us pretty quickly, so we have to do the same with this one. We got to learn from it"

The Penguins next face the Nashville Predators on Monday as they try to get back in the win column and into a playoff position.

Sidney Crosby and David Pastrnak exchange words over a late slapshot at the buzzer

Tensions boiled over between Sidney Crosby and David Pastrnak in the final seconds of the Bruins' 6-4 win over the Penguins. With the game already decided, Pastrnak wound up and fired a slapshot at Pittsburgh's empty net just as the final buzzer sounded.

The late shot angered Crosby, who immediately skated toward Pastrnak and exchanged heated words with the Bruins winger. Crosby was upset that Pastrnak took the unnecessary shot in a game that had already been decided.

The referees separated the two stars before the confrontation escalated into anything further.