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Crosby wins second straight for Pens in shootout

Mar 7, 2007 - 5:37 AM OTTAWA (Ticker) -- Sidney Crosby provided the Ottawa Senators a hat trick of which they wanted no part.

Crosby scored the decisive goal in the shootout for the second straight game as the Penguins came back from a three-goal third-period deficit to defeat the Senators, 5-4.

Rookie Jordan Staal started the comeback with a shorthanded tally and added an assist on Ryan Malone's game-tying goal with 7:50 left for Pittsburgh, which snapped a seven-game losing streak to Ottawa and won for just the third time in seven games overall.

"It was a big play for Staal to get that goal," Crosby said. "I think it was shorthanded, too. That's a big play."

When Staal scored that goal, we knew we had a chance. We had maybe 11 or 12 minutes left when he scored, so that goal really led the way to help put ourselves in a better position. (Gary Roberts') goal after that really put us in a position to get back in it. There's no doubt about that."

For the Senators, it was their third straight late-game collapse after going 8-0-1 in their previous nine games. On Friday, they yielded three unanswered goals in a 4-2 loss to Atlanta and two days later, they entered the third period with a 3-1 lead against Chicago before falling, 4-3, in the shootout.

"We have to learn from this," Ottawa center Mike Fisher said. "We know we're a good team, we've already proved that and we'll get better. It's disappointing, but we can't dwell on it now. We have to learn from it and obviously these are important games and an important part of the season. We just have to get back to the way we normally play. If we can do that we'll be fine.

"We sat back a little bit too much. Pittsburgh played really well too. They did a lot of good things, skated hard and didn't give up."

Erik Christensen scored in the first round of the shootout for Pittsburgh and Dean McAmmond scored in the third round for Ottawa to set the stage for Crosby, who had not registered a point all evening. The 20-year-old phenom skated in, deked to his backhand and easily beat goaltender Ray Emery, who went for the initial fake and was sprawled out over the ice.

"I'm trying to help out wherever I can," Crosby said. "It's been tough 5-on-5, struggling on the power play a bit, but we find a way to win. It's a team game and we all go through difficult times. For me, I guess it's one of those times right now, but I'm optimistic that it's going to start going, hopefully, regulation and shootouts. If it's got to be shootouts right now, that's fine. I'll try to do whatever I can to help."

Crosby, who has no goals and just two assists in his last five games, scored the shootout winner in Pittsburgh's 4-3 win against Philadelphia on Sunday.

"When games get as tight as they did here in the third period, you can't afford to let up no matter what the score is," Crosby said. "The way the first and second periods were, with all the penalties, I think that we knew in the back of our minds that if we got the 5-on-5, at least we're giving ourselves a chance.

"We didn't even give ourselves a chance in the first two periods with all the penalties we were taking. In the third period, we really gave ourselves a chance to play our game and hopefully get rewarded for it."

After yielding three first-period tallies, Pittsburgh starting goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury was replaced by Jocelyn Thibault, who stopped 15-of-16 shots.

The Penguins scored first on Colby Armstrong's ninth goal of the season 5:56 into the contest, but the Senators soon retaliated. Fisher rammed home his 15th goal of the season over the stick of Fleury at 9:27 of the first.

Just under two minutes later, Chris Schubert knocked in his own rebound from in front of the net for a 2-1 lead before Chris Kelly capped the first session when he drilled a one-timer from just behind the left circle that Fleury stopped with his glove, but the puck got behind him and trickled into the net.

Dany Heatley then scored his 10th goal in 12 games 4:32 into the second session for a 4-1 advantage.