The streak ends on a fluke

The streak was bound to end, on a night where the Pens played their 5th game in 7 nights, having won the previous four, but not on earth did you think they would lose this way.

They did not play great tonight, save for Jocelyn Thibault in net, and yet were in the game, tied 1-1 with under a minute to go in the third period. The Rangers rush in, and on a seemingly harmless play, Jaromir Jagr throws the puck out in front from behind the net. It caroms off of Pens defenseman Rob Scuderi, and underneath Thibault. It was not over the line, and the ref (Massenhoven) could not see the puck, yet inexplicably did not blow the whistle. There is no on-ice ruling initially, the goal light was not on, and instead of going upstairs first, Massenhoven waits, waits, waits, until Thibault moved, but by that point the puck was over the line. There was no way of knowing where the puck was when the whistle did or did not blow - as there had been further contact by a Rangers player with Thibault after the initial stop.

In the end, they gave the Rangers a goal where it could not be proved it was over the line when the play was stopped. The ruling also keeps the Rangers alive in the playoff race, and kept the Pens from narrowing NJ's division lead by at least a point. The Magic Number is still 7, and they still trail the Devils by 2 points, but now the Devils have the game in hand. The loss also dropped them from the 4th slot to the 5th slot by removing the game-in-hand advantage on Ottawa (also with 92 points overall), leaving Ottawa with the tiebreaker on wins (42 to 41).

The way the team (save Thibault) played, perhaps they deserved to lose. But they did not deserve to lose on the incompetence of the officials. It is unfortunate that the officiating has become just as much a part of the game as they players themselves, where no one is happy.