Penguins 4, Hurricanes 3 - OT

After their three day holiday rest, the Carolina Hurricanes started out strong but did not quite finish that way as the Pittsburgh Penguins came from behind to defeat them at home, 4-3 in overtime in front of 18,124 at the PNC Arena on Friday night.

That makes four losses in a row for the Canes, who have now just won a single game in their last eight starts, (1-3-4).

Carolina came out flying in the opening period and created double the chances, (6-3) and shots, (16-7) than the Pens did, who had to travel to Raleigh earlier this same day.   It looked like the home team would have nothing to show for their efforts though until Andrej Sekera backhanded a shot past Marc-Andre Fleury with just two seconds left in the period.

Sidney Crosby would tie the game up just 16 seconds into the second period with a backhander of his own.

The Hurricanes looked like they would be resilient this game though as Nathan Gerbe knocked in an Alexander Semin pass just 14 seconds after the Crosby goal to give his team back the lead.

The Canes skated well again most of the second and held onto their lead going into the third, but the Pens would assert themselves in the final period and outshot the Canes 9-6.

At 1:58 into the period, Chris Conner scored to tie things back up again and Deryk Engelland gave the Pens the lead with 6:45 left in the game.

Once again though, the Hurricanes would not go away.  After Ron Hainsey made a nice play keeping a bouncing puck in the zone, Drayson Bowman took a Patrick Dwyer shot around the back of the net and sent it toward Fleury.  The puck hit someone and went into the net, to tie things up with 2:29 left.

The game went into overtime, where the Hurricanes have not had much luck this season.  After a couple of shots on goal by the home team, James Neal and Jussi Jokinen worked a perfect give-and-go to score the game-winner.

The Canes are now 1-6 in overtime periods and 1-3 when the game goes to a shootout for a total record of 2-9 when the game ends up tied in regulation.

Former Cane, Jussi Jokinen, who is still on the Carolina payroll, earned three assists in the contest.

Next up for the Hurricanes is Toronto on Sunday night.

Game Notes:

• Justin Peters, who was a surprise start in this game, ended up with 22 saves on 26 shots, and seemed to have trouble with the 5-hole in this one.   Will he start again on Sunday?
• The Canes had 34 shots on goal and were led by Gerbe and Sekera who had five shots each.  They had 20 shots blocked and missed the net 16 times for a total of 70 shot attempts to 49 for the Pens, (26-8-15).
• Both teams were only called for one penalty and went 0-1 on the powerplay.
• Tim Gleason, Jordan Staal, Zach Boychuk, and Patrick Dwyer had four hits each, also team highs.
• The Canes had 25 takeaways.
• Ron Hainsey had a team high 23:27 of ice time.