Pittsburgh Penguins' Jake Guentzel celebrates his goal against the Nashville Predators during the third period in Game 2 of the Stanley Cup Final in Pittsburgh, on May 31, 2017.Gene J. Puskar/The Associated Press
Right around this time last year, the Pittsburgh Penguins coaxed Jake Guentzel to leave school early, on the grounds that they believed at age 21, he was ready to start his professional hockey career. So Guentzel skipped out on his senior year at the University of Nebraska-Omaha, joined the Penguins' minor-league team in Wilkes-Barre and managed to get into 10 playoff games last spring, scoring 14 points, a dazzling debut. Pittsburgh won the Stanley Cup without Guentzel, who was an engaged, interested spectator.
Now, almost 12 months later, Guentzel has become a central figure in the Penguins' Stanley Cup defence.
Guentzel scored twice Wednesday night and his second goal, 10 seconds into the third period, broke up a close game and led the Penguins to a 4-1 victory over the visiting Nashville Predators at the PPG Paints Arena.
Guentzel's two goals, along with a strong goaltending performance from Matt Murray, have given the Penguins a 2-0 lead in the best-of-seven series, as they try to become the first NHL team in two decades to defend the Stanley Cup.
The odds look good, too.
Fifty teams have taken a 2-0 series lead since the Stanley Cup final went to a best-of-seven format in 1939. Of those teams, 45 went on to win the Stanley Cup, including the Penguins last season.
Guentzel, who also scored the game-winning goal in the series' opener, has 12 goals in the playoffs, the second highest total ever by an NHL rookie, and five of them are game winners, an NHL record.
Moreover, he is now only two shy of tying the record of 14, established by Dino Ciccarelli of the Minnesota North Stars in 1981.
With 19 playoff points, Guentzel is also within hailing distance of the NHL scoring record for a rookie in a playoff year, shared by Ciccarelli and Philadelphia's Ville Leino (2010), with 21 points each.
Guentzel, whose locker stall is next to Sidney Crosby's in the Penguins' dressing room and who was once the stick boy for the University of Minnesota when Phil Kessel played there in the 2005-06 season, is closing in on a 50-goal season, if you count the 21 he scored in 33 games for Wilkes-Barre before getting promoted to the NHL, following a November injury to Chris Kunitz.
At the moment, Guentzel has scored 49 goals this season, the 21 in the minors, 16 more in 40 regular-season NHL games, and now all those playoff goals as well.
Once again, the Penguins were at their opportunistic best to defeat a Predators' team that held a wide territorial edge through the first two periods, which ended deadlocked at a goal each, only because of Murray's strong work in the Pittsburgh goal.
But off the opening faceoff of the third period, Guentzel converted the rebound of a Bryan Rust shot to give Pittsburgh a lead it wouldn't relinquish. Goals by Scott Wilson and Evgeni Malkin 15 seconds apart in the fourth minute chased Predators' starting goaltender Pekka Rinne, who had his second consecutive weak outing, after entering the Stanley Cup final as the No. 1 Conn Smythe Trophy candidate on most people's lists. Rinne has never beaten Pittsburgh as a starter in his career, his only victory coming years ago in relief.
The Penguins had a second-period stretch in which they didn't get a shot on goal for just over nine minutes, which was not nearly as disastrous as the series opener, in which they went a record 37 minutes without a shot.
The Predators are going home for Game 3 to perhaps the loudest arena in hockey at the moment, where tickets on the secondary market are going for astronomical prices.
Country singer Alan Jackson – Mr. It's Five O'clock Somewhere – will play a free live concert outside the arena before Game 3, where the Predators are 7-1 in these playoffs. If the Predators lose, it will be close to the witching hour.
Predators' coach Peter Laviolette is relying heavily on his top four defencemen – Roman Josi, P.K. Subban, Ryan Ellis and Mattias Ekholm – who are playing massive minutes, while Matt Irwin and Yannick Weber only get the occasional shift. With Vern Fiddler also receiving minimal playing time, the Predators are effectively playing with 15 position players. Early on, it didn't seem to affect their fore-checking, which was generally consistent and created a lot of down-low pressure on Murray. But when Pittsburgh made a third-period push, the Predators had no answers, their lack of playoff experience bubbling to the surface.
For the second game in a row, a goal was taken off the board after a coach's challenge, Laviolette successfully getting a score by Patric Hornqvist overturned when a video review deemed the play was offside. This one would have been Pittsburgh's fifth goal of the game and thus didn't materially affect the outcome.
Rookie Pontus Aberg scored for Nashville.
Separate minor penalties are rarely called against the same team on the same sequence, but it happened for the second game in a row, though this time, the calls went in Nashville's favour.
Referees Dan O'Halloran and Kevin Pollock signalled the Penguins' Evgeni Malkin and Chris Kunitz for hooking and crosschecking respectively at 9:36 of the opening period, giving the Predators a two-minute, two-man advantage. Nashville failed to capitalize, though the Penguins didn't escape the moment unscathed, losing centre Nick Bonino for half a period after he blocked Subban shot on the outside of his right knee, during the penalty kill.
Nashville's two-man advantage only lasted 62 seconds in total, because Mike Fisher took an unnecessary, undisciplined penalty for interference, reducing the advantage to a four-on-three.
Nashville held an 18-12 edge in first-period shots, notable only because Pittsburgh managed just 12 shots in total during a 5-3 victory in the first game of the series, which the Predators dominated territorially.