NEWARK, N.J. — Sidney Crosby is not, and has never been, what you'd call a very good loser.
I mean he hates losing the way my 7-year-old daughter hates vegetables. It's visceral. Certainly he hates losing more than any athlete I've ever witnessed. It's a large part of what's made him so great for over a decade.
Usually, you won’t see it in his face or hear it in his voice after bitter losses like Tuesday’s in Detroit or last week’s in Brooklyn. But you will see it in his feet. When he’s perturbed -- which has been far too often lately -- he'll clench his toes when he speaks to reporters while sitting at his locker stall. That's how you know.
TAP ABOVE FOR BOXSCORE, STANDINGS, VIDEONow, the guy has done just about everything in his career that any hockey player has ever done. Stanley Cups, World Cups, Olympics, Hart Trophy, Art Ross Trophy, you name it.
But sometimes even he needs a little motivation.
Check out this faceoff against the Devils' Travis Zajac with 4:08 left in what had been a 3-3 game:
That's Zajac rubbing a butt-end into the captain’s chest, apparently under his shoulder pads, too. Thus the reaction. Not a very nice thing to do. But why would Zajac try to provide any incentive for this opponent?
You wouldn't like Sidney Crosby when he's mad.
“For sure, every time you get hit, you get fired up,” Patric Hornqvist said of the play. “You get in the game quick. I don’t know what happened. But he was fired up after that and he got us the win.”
Yep, Crosby got the last dig on Zajac and and the Devils, preventing New Jersey from completing a season series sweep. The Penguins are now 13-6 in games that end after regulation.
Just 19 seconds into the 3-on-3 session, Kris Letang intercepted the puck and caromed a pass off the boards to Crosby waiting at the far blueline. Crosby skated deliberately down the left side, looked off Bryan Rust, and snapped a shot ... off the right post.
Don't worry, this had a happy ending for the Penguins, because Crosby, as probably only he can do, swatted the rebound out of the air for the 4-3 game-winner:
"I just tried to stay with it," Crosby was saying. "Was fortunate it came back to me."
Fortunate? Maybe.
Crosby's hand-eye coordination is the stuff of legend. Batting pucks out of the air is just what he does. Man, you'd have to go all the way back to, like, eight days ago when he did it last:
"Apparently, in the last few weeks he just wants to score by batting pucks in air," Letang was telling me with a big grin on his face. "Guess baseball season just started and Sid is right on time for that."
That goal above against the Canadiens might have been the finest of the 410 he's scored, or at least on the short list. Crosby followed up that goal with another pretty impressive goal last Sunday against the Flyers with Sean Couturier draped all over him.
But if you're counting, Crosby now has goals in five straight games, matching a season-high, and 28 on the season. Not a bad time of year to get the best player in the world going, eh?
Oh, but why is that last number, 28, important? Again, motivation.
With four games to go in the regular season, assuming he plays in all of them, Crosby should top the 30-goal mark for the eighth time in his career. The only time he's failed to hit the big 3-0 when playing 55 or more games was in 2014-15, or the last full season of the Mike Johnston Era.
Crosby hates to lose. By scoring goals, whether of the highlight reel-variety or not, he gives his team the best chance to win. He did Thursday night and nobody should be surprised by that.
"He’s just an elite player," Mike Sullivan said. "There’s not too many guys who can make those type of plays and he does it time and time again. He thinks the game at such a high level. He’s such a competitor."
