DETROIT – For almost a week, the dominant theme was how the Pittsburgh Penguins appeared to be coming of age, ready to be the best.
Last night, however, they looked far too immature to win a Stanley Cup.
Funny thing, the Pens started well against the defending champion Detroit Red Wings. But it all went downhill after the opening three minutes. By the second period the rout was on, the classy Motowners showed they might still have a lesson or two to teach their opponents about composure, and multi-talented Pavel Datsyuk had made a triumphant, two-assist return in an overwhelming 5-0 Detroit win.
"The more I played the better I felt," said Datsyuk.
Did he have his injured foot frozen in order to play?
"I don't know," he said with a slight smile. "It's a secret."
As far as the Wings being old and tired? Uh, not so much.
In fact, the comments from Pittsburgh players like Brooks Orpik and head coach Dan Bylsma that Detroit players, specifically Henrik Zetterberg, looked tired in Games 3 and 4 in Pennsylvania rankled the veteran Wings.
"When we play well, do our guys talk about their team like that?" asked Wings head coach Mike Babcock after last night's game. "It's amazing how tired you look when you're not scoring."
But here was the inexplicable part from last night: The Pens were down 3-0 with more than 33 minutes left to play in the game, a troublesome margin to be sure, but not impossible to overcome.
But instead of trying to mount a comeback, the Pens got chippy and peevish, as though they were annoyed the Wings were no longer willing to play along with the kids-beat-the-old-guys script.
Bylsma seemed to simply accept his team's loss of composure and chalked it up to "emotions."
"I wasn't surprised how we reacted," he said.
First Evgeni Malkin – who took three minors on the night – nailed Johan Franzen in the head with an elbow.
Brian Rafalski scored on the power play to make it 4-0.
Then Chris Kunitz roughed Darren Helm because Helm had the temerity to miss Sidney Crosby with an open-ice hit attempt.
So Zetterberg scored to make it 5-0, driving Marc-Andre Fleury from the net.
Crosby, invisible on the attack all night, slashed at Zetterberg's leg for no reason at 17:37, then Max Talbot made a rather obvious attempt to take a shot at Datsyuk's injured foot and was sent off for tripping.
"That gave us a 5-on-3 power play," shrugged Datsyuk. "I'll take the 5-on-3."
After five games in eight days, including a series-opening back-to-back set, the Cup final now settles into a more leisurely pace, with Game 6 on Tuesday and a seventh game, if necessary, on Friday.
All along, the Detroit brass felt if they could get to Game 5 no worse than even and get Datsyuk back, it would improve their chances immensely for the final part of the series.
Now, the added off-days should help Datsyuk, who played 17:38 and delivered four hits, including a thunderous knockdown on Malkin in the first period.
"We rushed (Datsyuk) back, believe me," said Babcock, who wore his lucky McGill University tie. "If this was a regular-season game he wouldn't be playing. But you know, after a while, what do you save him for? There's only summer. Everyone can get better in the summer."
The Pens need to become the first team since the 1971 Montreal Canadiens to capture the Cup by winning Game 6 at home and then Game 7 on the road.
Crosby noticed Datsyuk's return.
"He looked good out there, made a play on the first goal," said the Pittsburgh captain. "We just made mistakes, so it doesn't matter who's out there."
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