Yesterday, in Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Finals, the Pens lost to the Red Wings 4-0.

Well, I thought we would lose one in Detroit. Now, we must rebound and win Game 2 on Memorial Day.

The Penguins through the first two periods looked about how I figured they would look, except that I thought there would be more than 0 goals in our favor.

Well, I have loads of confidence entering the 3rd, but what I was hoping for never happened.

I’ll tell you why. The Penguins looked like they did against Philly, only without the goals, and it’s as simple as that. If Biron, Lundqvist, Nabakov, or even Turco was the goalie in red, we would have won the game 4-1 or 4-2. But, the fact of the matter is that it was Chris Osgood in the nets for Detroit. He never let anything by him, nothing even got close.

The Pens offense looked great up until the start of the third. I’m guessing that we dropped off a bit because this entire post-season, we’ve never had a situation where we haven’t been able to score at will. Now we do, and we need to somehow exploit Osgood. We had too many costly turnovers and oddman rushes against us. We need to mainly take care of the puck better, and not let Detroit stay in the game.

Marc-Andre Fleury didn’t look himself, right from the entrance onto the ice, because upon touching the frozen water, he slipped and fell, and looked as though he may have hurt his leg. Maybe, maybe not, I’m not trying to make excuses, but he just didn’t look well during the final 30 minutes of the game.

For us to pull off a win in MoTown, we need to have more pop in the offense, and score early, rather than late, because perhaps our loss of momentum was caused by our guys not getting a goal in the first 2 periods.

Crosby and Malkin will get better, and will be better in Monday’s game, I guarantee it. But, there’s no way the Wings are gonna shut us out again.

My prediction for Monday’s game: Penguins-3, Red Wings-2

-Mike Greenspire

Here are the current standings in my NHL Playoff Pick Em Game!