A few notes before the start of the Stanley Cup finals.
Pavel Datsyuk and Kris Draper are out of the Detroit lineup. Justin Abdelkader and Ville Leino will replace them in the lineup.
Jonathan Ericsson has made an unbelievable recovery. He underwent an emergency appendectomy on Wednesday and is in the starting lineup for Game 1.
It'll be Chris Osgood and Marc-Andre Fleury in the nets for Detroit and Pittsburgh respectively.
The Penguins will go with 11 forwards and seven defensemen. Look for the Pens to double shift either Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin throughout the game.
Back after the first period.
Here are the lineups for both teams.
PITTSBURGH
Kunitz-Crosby-Guerin
Fedotenko-Malkin-Talbot
Cooke-Staal-Kennedy
Adams-Satan
Gonchar-Orpik
Gill-Scuderi
Eaton-Letang
Boucher
DETROIT
Franzen-Zetterberg-Hudler
Cleary-Filppula-Hossa
Holmstrom-Helm-Samuelsson
Leino-Abdelkader-Maltby
Lidstrom-Rafalski
Stuart-Kronwall
Ericsson-Lebda
Detroit 1 Pittsburgh 1 after the first period.
Both teams were flying in the first.
Detroit, who are 8-1 when scoring first, opened the scoring on a poor play by goalie Marc-Andre Fleury. Brad Stuart took a shot from the point that Fleury stopped. The puck went off the end boards and back towards Fleury. It hit him in the back of the leg and went into the net.
The Penguins tied the game up at one with 1:23 left in the opening stanza when Chris Osgood made a nice save off an Evgeni Malkin shot, but he couldn't corral the rebound and Ruslan Fedotenko buried the puck into the empty net.
There were no penalties in the first and the Red Wings outshot Pittsburgh 11-7.
Pittsburgh did not score in its first two games in the Stanley Cup finals last year against Detroit, so Fedotenko's goal is a very good sign for the Penguins.
No one had more than one shot on goal in the first and four players, Rafalski, Zetterberg, Franzen and Crosby played over seven minutes.
Back after the second.
DETROIT 2 PITTSBURGH 1 after two.
Johan Franzen put the Red Wings ahead on another bad goal allowed by Fleury. He scored behind the icing line. Fleury has been outstanding as long as the puck is in front of him.
Osgood was terrific in the second, especially stopping Malkin on a clear cut breakaway three-and-a-half minutes into the period.
The Red Wings were outshot 13-11 in the second but lead 22-20 overall.
Pittsburgh defensemen Hal Gill and Rob Scuderi have been on the ice for both Detroit goals.
Gonchar (3:44) and Letang (3:01) have been the Pittsburgh point men for most of the two Penguin power plays.
Nicklas Lidstrom (15:40) and Sidney Crosby (15:07) are the only two players over 15 minutes thus far.
Detroit is dominating the face offs after two periods, winning 26 of 37 draws. Helm is 8 of 10 and Zetterberg is 8 of 13 while Crosby is 6 of 13 and Staal is 3 of 12.
Back after the third.
FINAL
Detroit 3 Pittsburgh 1
Detroit leads the best-of-seven final 1-0
Justin Abdelkader scored the only goal of the third. The rookie potted his first NHL playoff goal as he banged home his own rebound, past Fleury who had no chance.
It was a fast-paced game. Osgood stopped 31 of 32 shots while Fleury stopped 27 of 30.
There were only three penalties called all game, all in the second period.
Nicklas Lidstrom led everyone in TOI, playing 24:07 minutes while Sergei Gonchar led the Penguins with 23:21 minutes of ice time.
Bill Guerin led both teams with five shots on net, while teammates Evgeni Malkin and Chris Kunitz had four apiece. No Detroit player had more than three shots.
Detroit dominated the face off circle winning 38 of 55 draws. Staal won only 6 of 19, but it was still better than Crosby who won 6 of 20. Zetterberg was an outstanding 15 of 20 and Darren Helm won 11 of 15.
Game 2 is tomorrow in Detroit. Look for the veteran Red Wings to come out a bit flat as the Penguins are a lot younger and should be able to handler to back-to-back games better than Detroit.
