Pens two wins away

Penguins 4 Flyers 2

PITTSBURGH — The Pittsburgh Penguins are two wins away from the Stanley Cup final. With the Philadelphia Flyers down their best two defencemen, it seems likely they’ll get there.

Maxime Talbot scored the winning goal 8:51 into the third period Sunday night to lift the Penguins to a 4-2 win over the Flyers, handing Pittsburgh a 2-0 lead in the Eastern Conference final.

Marian Hossa, Sidney Crosby and Jordan Staal, into an empty net, also scored for the Penguins, who won their 15th straight home game and improved to an impressive 10-1 overall in the NHL playoffs.

Mike Richards and Jeff Carter had the goals for the Flyers, who limp back to Philadelphia for Game 3 on Tuesday night now missing Braydon Coburn as well as Kimmo Timonen from their blue-line corps. Those are huge holes to fill.

The game was only 1:51 old and the Flyers were handed a serious setback when Coburn left a trail of blood behind him after taking the puck in the face from Hal Gil’s point shot. Coburn did not return, reportedly needing more than 40 stitches. Timomen went down before the series with a blood clot in his leg.

“My left eye is swollen shut right now. I will keep the ice on it and get the swelling down and see what happens tomorrow,” said Coburn in quotes distributed by the Flyers, adding he may be available for Game 3.

Two minutes after the Coburn injury, the sellout crowd of 17,132 at Mellon Arena was on its feet as Penguins winger Tyler Kennedy and Flyers forward Scottie Upshall exchanges blows at centre ice in a violent bout. That set the tone for a more physical and emotional game than the series opener, with both teams finishing their checks with authority.

Crosby opened the scoring on a power play at 10:48 when his pass attempt in front delfected off Flyers defenceman Lasse Kukkonen and past Martin Biron. The Flyers goalie had moved off his post anticipating the pass to Ryan Malone in the slot.

It appeared as though the Penguins had gone up 2-0 with 3:19 left in the first period but a video review came back negative on Crosby’s tap-in.

“Since video review of the play proved inconclusive as to if the puck crossed the goal line, the call of no goal on the ice stands,” the league said in a statement.

The call seemed to spark the Flyers, who came back strong. Carter tied it 1-1 5:46 into the second period, one-timing a nifty Joffrey Lupul pass from the corner.

Biron then made a series of solid saves to keep the game tied, notably a sparkling pad save on Kennedy.

Hossa put the home side back up a goal at 13:43 on another power play, fishing out a rebound in front and backhanding a shot past a sprawled Biron.

Richards, Philadelphia’s best player early on in this series, pulled the Flyers back into a tie at 2-2 when he stole a pass attempt from Evgeni Malkin at the Flyers blue-line on a Pittsburgh power play and broke in alone on Marc-Andre Fleury, beating the Penguins goalie top corner on the glove side with 24 seconds left in the second period.

The Flyers had talked about limiting their turnovers after coughing up the puck over and over again in Game 1. The winner Sunday night came when both Steve Downie and Derian Hatcher failed to get the puck out of their own end. Eventually Gary Roberts got it in the corner and fed Talbot all alone in front. And it was bedlam at Mellon.