On the night when legendary Kings forward Luc Robitaille had his statue unveiled at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, it was the goaltenders that stole the show.
Through three periods of regulation and 1:44 of overtime on Saturday night, it seemed as if goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury and Jonathan Quick would never give up a goal. The Pittsburgh Penguins and Los Angeles Kings had held each other to just 48 shots and it seemed certain that a shootout would be needed to settle the score.
That was all before Patric Hornqvist created a turnover in the Kings’ zone and fired a wrister past Quick to give the Penguins a 1-0 victory in Los Angeles. Hornqvist’s overtime winner was unassisted, and was his sixth goal in his last seven games.
“The puck just came to me,” Hornqvist said of his winning tally. “I just shot it as fast as I could and it was nice to see that it went in.”
Fleury was outstanding in goal for the Penguins, stopping all 31 Kings shots to earn the game’s first star.
“It’s nice to see the guys just going at it, and getting to the dirty areas, and getting the puck to the goal,” he said.
Fleury’s shutout was his league-leading ninth of the season and extends his Penguins franchise record for most shutouts in a season.
“My teammates have been great,” he added of his defense’s strong play in front of him. “That’s always great when you’re the goalie.”
The closest the Kings came to scoring a goal was early in the third period, when they did put one past Fleury and into the Penguins net, but it was ruled that Kings forward Dustin Brown had interfered with the Pens goaltender.
The Penguins will wrap up their four-game west coast swing on Monday in San Jose for a 10:00 p.m. faceoff against the Sharks.
Photo credit: NHL
