Jarry, Penguins get second straight shutout in win against Maple Leafs
Tristan Jarry made 26 saves for his second straight shutout, and the Pittsburgh Penguins defeated the Toronto Maple Leafs 2-0 at Scotiabank Arena on Saturday.
“I’m just going night in and night out focusing on my game doing everything I can, and the guys are doing a great job getting blocks, getting clears when we need to,” Jarry said. “I think that has been the key to our success, especially as of lately.”
Jarry made 24 saves in a 6-0 win against the Montreal Canadiens on Thursday for his first shutout of the season. He has not allowed a goal in 151:06.
“He’s just steady, that’s the biggest thing,” Penguins center Sidney Crosby said. “Some of those saves, especially with the guys they have out there on 5-on-3’s, he’s calm, looks real calm in there. Not only is that great when he’s making the saves, but the way he looks, too, he looks calm in there, so that’s huge. We’ve got some good penalty killers, but your goalie has to be your best killer, and he was tonight.”
Jake Guentzel extended his goal streak to four games and his point streak to five games (four goals, two assists) for the Penguins (7-6-4), who have won two straight after losing three in a row.
“Tonight was tough, we had to defend a lot,” Crosby said. “They generated some good zone time and obviously with the power plays late, they were hanging around, so it was a good win.”
Jack Campbell made 29 saves for the Maple Leafs (12-6-1), who had won five in a row and 10 of their previous 11.
“Not tonight, we didn’t [get to the net],” Maple Leafs forward Mitchell Marner said. “I think we do give a lot of goalies free nights when they come in here, not getting around the net and not having enough people around it.”
Leading 2-0 in the third period, Pittsburgh killed a 5-on-3 Toronto power play for 1:49 after Jason Zucker (14:47) and Zach Aston-Reese (14:58) were each called for tripping.
“I just think our guys were committed. They were blocking shots, they were working together as a group,” Penguins coach Mike Sullivan said. “Tristan made a couple of big saves, Brock McGinn had a huge block. When you are up against a group like that, they are so dynamic and so skilled, you certainly have a big challenge ahead of you for that extended period of time, but I thought our guys did a tremendous job.”
Toronto was 0-for-4 on the power play.
“Just like how we lost to a good team, we lost to a good penalty kill,” Maple Leafs coach Sheldon Keefe said. “They were just flat out better than us tonight.”
The Penguins took a 1-0 lead at 5:46 of the first period when Guentzel pulled the puck around Rasmus Sandin and beat Campbell with a backhand in the slot.
“The puck just goes in sometimes like that,” Guentzel said of his goal streak. “I’m just trying to throw pucks on the net and it’s just going in right now. Sometimes you get the bounces and you feed off it when it’s going in, so I’m on a good little stretch here. On my goal, it was a semi 2-on-1 and their guy kind of got back on [Crosby], so I just tried to take it to the middle and I had a little space to get a shot off there.”
Jeff Carter made it 2-0 at 17:15 when he got position on Jake Muzzin in the slot and scored off a pass from Zucker.
“Just how hard they play is what stood out to me,” Keefe said. “I thought the first period, the goals they scored were very similar in nature. Handling their speed coming through the neutral zone was a problem for us there. Then they just defend real hard and make it tough on you. We got what we deserved in terms of our offense, we just didn’t make enough happen there tonight.”
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