Pens Top Flyers 4-2 to Clinch Atlantic

[April 03, 2008]  PITTSBURGH (AP) -- Sidney Crosby scored twice and Evgeni Malkin netted the go-ahead goal for the Pittsburgh Penguins, who clinched their first division title in 10 years with a 4-2 win over the Philadelphia Flyers on Wednesday night.

The Penguins secured the Atlantic Division title only two years after they had the Eastern Conference's worst record and the NHL's second-worst mark. They also overtook idle Montreal for the East lead by two points. The Canadiens have two games remaining, at home Thursday against Buffalo, and Saturday against Toronto. Pittsburgh ends the regular season Sunday at Philadelphia.

Pittsburgh hadn't won a division title since taking the Northeast in 1997-98, the season after Hall of Famer Mario Lemieux retired for the first time. The Penguins have 102 points to 97 for division rival New Jersey, which beat Boston 3-2 in a shootout but can finish with no more than 101 points.

The Penguins, winning their eighth in a row at home to assure themselves of no worse than the No. 2 seeding in the conference playoffs, trailed 2-1 after the first before turning to their two stars for the game's two biggest goals.

All four were scored on the power play.

Only 19 seconds after Crosby drew a charging penalty from Scott Hartnell that put the Flyers down two men, Crosby took Sergei Gonchar's pass and beat goalie Martin Biron with a one-timer from a bad angle along the edge of the right circle. It was Crosby's first goal in four games since returning from a seven-game layoff with a sprained ankle. He added the 24th of his injury-interrupted season late in the third.

Gonchar scored Pittsburgh's first goal midway through the first and had two assists.

Malkin, chosen as the Penguins' MVP by the team, made it 3-2 later in the period when the Flyers apparently thought he was going to the bench after being on the ice for 1 1/2 minutes of a power play.

Instead, Malkin swooped in after two Flyers collided with Pittsburgh's Ryan Whitney near the top of the left circle, grabbed the puck and beat Biron with a hard wrist shot for his 47th goal, making it 4-2.

Crosby scored again by redirecting Sergei Gonchar's pass from the right point with 1:34 remaining. The Penguins went 4-for-6 on the power play to the Flyers' 1-for-5.

It was a potentially costly loss for the Flyers, who began the night needing four points in their final three games to assure themselves of making the playoffs. They fell into eighth place in the conference, a point behind Boston and only one ahead of Washington.

In a physical game filled with pushing and shoving and plenty of sticks to the midsection, there were two fights and three other skirmishes in the first period when the Flyers took a 2-1 lead on goals by Hartnell and Jeff Carter that were slightly less than 5 minutes apart. But Penguins goalie Marc-Andre Fleury allowed no other goals on the 29 shots he faced.

Notes: Philadelphia had been 5-0-1 since a 7-1 loss in Pittsburgh on March 16. ... The Penguins sold out all 41 home games for the first time in the franchise's 41-year history. ... Malkin is four points behind Washington's Alex Ovechkin in the scoring race, 110-106. ... The Flyers won the first four games of the season series by a combined score of 20-8, but the Penguins have won the last three by 15-6.

[Associated Press; By ALAN ROBINSON]

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