Dave Andreychuk looked to have the puck glued to his stick during one particular shift on Wednesday night in New Jersey and no matter how hard he tried, a Devils defenseman just couldn't wrestle the puck from the Lightning captain.
"Come on!" a Devils fan yelled. "The guy is 60 years old!"
Even at his advanced age (42, not 60), Andreychuk is still making a difference and infuriating opposing fans. Take Wednesday. With the Lightning tied 3-3 in the third period, Andreychuk scored the winning goal and tacked on another for insurance in a 6-3 victory for his first two goals of the season.
PHOTO: AP
He's not the goal scorer he once was. That's not even his role anymore. He's supposed to win a few faceoffs. Play good defense. Stand in front on power plays. Kill penalties.
No longer is he expected to carry a team offensively as he was back in his heyday.
But don't tell him that.
PHOTO: AP
"I have to chip in with goals every once in a while," Andreychuk said. "I think I have the attitude that a lot of us have and have to have. I know there's a lot of pressure on our key players to score every night. So you shouldn't just think it's okay if we don't score. We all need to chip in."
Andreychuk has been doing more than chipping in for 22 years. He has more power-play goals (271) than anyone in NHL history. He is 11th in league history with 636 goals and second among left wings.
"Scoring goals," Andreychuk said, "has been my bread and butter."
It still is, according to him. It's obvious he isn't satisfied with simply riding out his career as a faceoff specialist who knows how to play defense. His two-goal performance on Wednesday was, to him, another day at the office.
"Nothing he does surprises me," teammate Tim Taylor said. "The reason he has a lot of great statistics doesn't have to do with longevity. It's because he's such a great player. I don't expect anything less from him because that's the way he is."
In four seasons with the Lightning, Andreychuk has never scored fewer than 20 goals. In fact, he has scored at least 20 goals an incredible 19 times. Yet, each passing season, he has seen as a checking forward and any goals he scores are simply icing.
Strange thinking about one of the most dominant scorers in NHL history who manages to keep on ticking.
"I still expect to score," Andreychuk said. "I went into this year thinking I have the chance to score a lot of goals. Knowing that there were going to be a lot of penalties called, I would continue to get chances to score."
With all the penalties, Andreychuk's role is changing. Lightning coach John Tortorella said Thursday he wants Andreychuk to play less and less in five-on-five situations. On Wednesday, Andreychuk centered what one would consider the fourth line with rookie wings Evgeny Artyukhin and Nick Tarnasky.
Tortorella wants to save Andreychuk for power plays, penalty killing and key faceoffs.
Tortorella thinks it will make him more effective in games and more effective as the NHL season gets into the dog days of the season. As it is, Andreychuk is playing nearly 15 minutes a game.
"Special teams and faceoffs -- that's the most important role David has right now," Tortorella said. "But Andy will get his ice time. Andy is not going to be a 5-6 minute man. He's still going to get the proper amount of ice time."
Of course, Andreychuk's biggest asset continues to be his leadership. It was Andreychuk who ordered a players-only meeting following a disheartening 4-1 loss to Ottawa last Friday. The team responded with the impressive victory against New Jersey and it was Andreychuk leading the charge.
By night's end, you look at the statistics and see that Andreychuk has seven points in 10 games. Map that out over a whole season and that's equal to a 57-point season, including 16 goals.
That's more than respectable for a 42-year-old, fourth-line, special-team, faceoff, defensive specialist. But it is short of his magic 20-goal mark.
"That doesn't matter to me," Andreychuk said. "I guess if you achieve something like that, it's nice. But it's not as important as being consistent. But that number doesn't matter. What matters is winning games, winning divisions, win playoff games.
"At the same time, it's not okay not to score. I expect to score."
Mario Lemieux scored twice during a five-point night and the Pittsburgh Penguins rallied from a four-goal deficit to beat the reeling Atlanta Thrashers 7-5 on Thursday and win for the first time this season.
Down four goals halfway through the first period, the Penguins stormed back with a team record-tying six power-play goals.
The Penguins, in danger of a blowout loss after Ilya Kovalchuk scored once and set up three goals in the opening 9:50, needed 10 games for their first victory -- easily the longest stretch in franchise history. The Penguins have at least one point in all but four games, but are 1-4-5.
Lemieux, Sergei Gonchar and John LeClair each scored twice on the power play as all but one of the Penguins' seven consecutive goals against goalie Steve Shields in his first start of the season came with a man advantage. The only other time in their 39-season history the Penguins scored six power-play goals was Dec. 12, 1986, against Toronto in an 8-3 victory.
Avalanche 6, Canucks 2
In Denver, Milan Hejduk scored his 200th career goal to help lift Colorado over Vancouver and Todd Bertuzzi, who was booed all night in his first game in Denver since breaking Avalanche forward Steve Moore's neck.
Pierre Turgeon scored twice for the Avalanche to reach 499 for his career, as Colorado snapped the Canucks' six-game winning streak in the first of two straight games between the Northwest Division rivals in Denver. The rematch is Saturday.
The booing continued steadily all night -- every time Bertuzzi came onto the ice, every time he came close to the puck and especially when he got an assist on a third-period goal by Ryan Kesler.
Joe Sakic, Steve Konowalchuk and Ian Laperriere also scored for Colorado.
Avs goalie David Aebischer made 40 saves, including 22 during a third period in which the Canucks outshot Colorado by an embarrassing 23-0. It barely mattered, though, because the Avs were nursing a 6-1 lead after two periods.
Bruins 2, Maple Leafs 1
In Boston, Hannu Toivonen made 36 saves, and the Bruins earned their first Northeast Division victory of the season by beating Toronto.
Boston, which had been 0-5-1 in its division, won for just the second time in seven games.
Eric Lindros cut the deficit to 2-1 with 2:37 left when he scored his eighth goal, jamming the puck past Toivonen.
Flyers 5, Panthers 4, OT
In Philadelphia, Peter Forsberg tied the game in the final minute of regulation and Joni Pitkanen scored early in overtime to lead the Flyers to a win over Florida.
Only 49 seconds away from their second straight loss, Forsberg instead picked a perfect time to score his first goal of the season. After missing a penalty shot that could have tied it minutes earlier, Forsberg knocked one past Roberto Luongo after the Flyers pulled goalie Robert Esche.
Nathan Horton, Olli Jokinen and Kristian Huselius each scored power-play goals for the Panthers.
Rangers 3, Islanders 1
In New York, Jaromir Jagr assisted on a pair of first-period goals and Henrik Lundqvist stopped 31 shots to lead the Rangers over the Islanders.
The Rangers killed all 11 penalties called against them, and Lundqvist made a game-saving stop on Robert Nilsson's shot with 2:19 left.
Jagr set up Martin Straka for his first goal of the season at 13:22 of the first period.
Fedor Tyutin scored his second goal of the season at 16:26.
Red Wings 5, Blackhawks 2
In Detroit, Manny Legace made 21 saves to become the first NHL goalie to win 10 games in a month and Mathieu Schneider scored twice for the Red Wings.
Henrik Zetterberg, Kris Draper and Brendan Shanahan also scored for Detroit, which got two assists each from Pavel Datsyuk and Robert Lang and won for the 10th time in 11 games.
Matt Ellison and Jaroslav Spacek scored for Chicago.
Senators 4, Canadiens 3, OT
In Ottawa, Jason Spezza scored 2:48 into overtime for the Senators.
Dany Heatley, who scored one of Ottawa's two power-play goals in the second period, took the puck from Montreal's Richard Zednik in the Senators zone and passed to Spezza.
Montreal's Michael Ryder scored his fifth of the season in the first period and assisted on both of Mike Ribeiro's power-play goals in the second.
Coyotes 3, Flames 2
In Glendale, Arizona, Curtis Joseph needed to make only 13 saves to earn his 400th NHL victory, and Mike Comrie scored twice to lift Phoenix.
Comrie netted the winner when he backhanded a rebound past Philippe Sauve with 1:28 left. It gave Phoenix its fourth win in six games and made Joseph the ninth NHL goalie to reach 400 victories, following two straight losses.
Jarome Iginla and Andrew Ference scored for the Flames, and Daymond Langkow had two assists.
Zbynek Michalek had Phoenix's first goal, and Paul Mara had two assists.
Sauve finished with 31 saves.
There were sighs of relief when Derek Armstrong reported the groin pain that caused him to leave Thursday's practice early wouldn't keep him out of tonight's game.
Armstrong quietly has become one of the Kings' most valuable forwards, which is saying something for a team that also includes Jeremy Roenick, Luc Robitaille and Pavol Demitra.
"He's not as underrated now as he was previously," coach Andy Murray said. "Two years ago teams were paying US$5 million for what Derek Armstrong is doing."
Armstrong is making US$760,000 this season, low even in the new salary-cap era, but with two goals and seven assists in his first 10 games and some solid defensive play, he has had an impact.
After seven quiet NHL seasons, Armstrong, now 32, landed with the Kings in 2002-03 and found a home. He scored a career-high 14 goals last season and found success centering a line with Robitaille, but shrugs off the suggestion that he is underrated.
READY TO GO
Roenick, who missed Tuesday's game with nagging injuries, skated Thursday and said he will play tonight against San Jose.
"One game is enough; two is not acceptable," Roenick said.
Roenick has been slowed by groin and hamstring injuries but said the hamstring was no longer an issue after taking most of the previous three days off.
HEADED TO ITALY
A Canadian Press report said USA Hockey has submitted a list of players under preliminary consideration for next year's Olympic roster, a list that includes Roenick.
The report said the list included the 39 players who participated in an orientation camp in September.
JUST SAY NO
After Thursday's practice, the Kings listened to a presentation from league officials about health issues, particularly the use of performance-enhancing drugs.
Under terms of the new collective-bargaining agreement, players will be tested twice during the season. Players would be suspended 20 days for a first positive test for performance-enhancing drugs, 60 days for a second and be banned from the league after a third.
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