Penguins Edge Rangers In Metro Showdown

PITTSBURGH — It’s difficult to get a read on Tristan Jarry. The reserved Pittsburgh Penguins goaltender speaks with a monotone that makes it hard to tell if he’s coming off his best performance of the season, or his worst. It’s a steadiness that has fueled Jarry to a pair of All-Star appearances. Yet, look hard enough at the way Jarry plays, and there’s an edge now that didn’t exist a year ago during a forgettable first-round playoff loss to the New York Islanders. Jarry no longer sits back in his crease. Instead he’s out there cutting down angles and occasionally mixing it up in the process. Jarry calls it “taking the ice that’s mine.” He claimed plenty of it in a taut 1-0 victory over the New York Rangers on Saturday that leapfrogged the Penguins over their rivals for second-place in the tight Metropolitan Division. Two days after getting pulled for the first time all season in a dismal loss to last-place New Jersey — a game in which he allowed five goals on 19 shots thanks in large part to some shaky play in front of him — Jarry turned aside all 27 shots he saw from the Rangers to post the 11th shutout of his career, tied with Matt Murray and Les Binkley for third-most in team history. Evgeni Malkin provided the difference with a power-play goal 5:09 into the third period when he went down to one knee to rifle a snapshot from the right circle past Igor Shesterkin. The score was Malkin’s eighth of the season. Pittsburgh ended a three-game losing streak by returning to the kind of responsible, disciplined play that was the team’s hallmark until a recent dip in which they were shaky in losses to Toronto, Carolina and the Islanders. Shesterkin finished with 25 saves, but the Rangers, who tested Jarry early and late, ended their six-game point streak.