Montreal Canadiens 4 vs. Pittsburgh Penguins 3
Monday, September 21, 2009 at the Bell Center in (Montreal)
Preseason game
Once again, the new acquisitions of the Montreal Canadiens have allowed them to hold their own in the game during the fifth preseason game tonight at the Bell Center, Brian Gionta and Scott Gomez were the architects of the 4 to 3 victory against the Pittsburgh Penguins.
Gionta was the first to register on the scoreboard late in the first period with Andrei Markov & Jaroslav Spacek registering an assist.
Carey Price kept the fort, resisting the Penguins' 14 shots in the first third of the game to allow his men to retreat to the locker room with a 1-0 lead.
But the hungry young Penguins were able to pierce the wall of Canadiens. Sergei Gonchar and Evgeni Malkin each scored a goal in the second period to turn the tide.
Jacques Martin troop, however, regained control of the match in the third period.
A minor injury suffered by Max Pacioretty forced the Canadians coach to revise these trios. His decision to send Mike Cammalleri in the fray along with Gomez and Gionta has paid off.
Scott Gomez tied the game by completing a nice pass from Brian Gionta on a daring climb shorthanded.
Then there is the trio of Maxim Lapierre, Andrei Kostitsyn and Guillaume Latendresse, who added one more a few minutes later, before Gionta returned to the charge to register his second of the game.
The Penguins, tenacious, reduced the gap to 4-3 with a goal from Bill Guerin with under 5 minutes left in the game, but the Canadians defense successfully resisted the comeback to win the hot duel.
Not surprisingly, Brian Gionta was awarded the first star of the game, ending his evening with a harvest of 2 goals and 1 assist.
