The Penguins' go-ahead goal in the second period of Tuesday's 5-4 win over the Canucks was a thing of beauty from all involved from start to finish.
It came at 4-on-4, and started with the Canucks winning a board battle that started behind their net, and J.T. Miller setting up Ilya Mikheyev to carry the puck out of their end.
Jan Rutta, after initially losing the battle, pressured Mikeheyev for the length of the Canucks' end. That allowed Malkin to do this:
Malkin swept in and stripped Mikheyev of the puck, creating a 2-on-1 opportunity for himself and Jason Zucker on Oliver Ekman-Larsson. Malkin dropped the pass back to Zucker, who then set up Malkin with a backhand pass. Malkin easily tapped it in past Canucks goaltender Spencer Martin.
"Zucker, unbelievable," Malkin told me of that goal after the game. "They had a turnover, we go 2-on-1. I dropped the puck to Zucker and just go to the net, far post. I saw that he's loose, and he moved the puck to his backhand so I know that he's passing to me across. I'm just ready to score."
The goal was Malkin's second goal and third point of the game after also scoring the Penguins' opening goal and getting the primary assist on Zucker's tying goal. Malkin would later make it four points on the night in the third period with the primary assist on Rickard Rakell's game-winning power play goal. The four-point performance is his first of the season, and his first since the Penguins' 11-2 win over the Red Wings on March 27 last season.
Malkin called the goal "huge for us," not only within the context of the game, but also because it was only the second time this season that the Penguins have been able to capitalize at 4-on-4.
"Maybe we'll start to play better at 3-on-3, 4-on-4," Malkin said.
