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After Mario Lemieux, center, picked himself off the ice after being slashed by the New York Rangers' Adam Graves earlier in the playoffs, the Penguins captain picked up the Stanley Cup in 1992.
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Ron Cook: Playoff history shows how well Penguins respond to major adversity

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Ron Cook: Playoff history shows how well Penguins respond to major adversity

Adam Graves’ slash on Mario Lemieux at New York’s Madison Square Garden.

Frank Pietrangelo’s save against the New Jersey Devils.

Kevin Stevens’ guarantee in Boston.

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Boston coach Mike Milbury’s “Professor of Goonism” characterization of Badger Bob Johnson.

Sidney Crosby leaves the game with this high stick from Matt Niskanen.
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The Minnesota North Stars’ premature Stanley Cup parade plans.

Surreal goals by Jaromir Jagr and Lemieux against the Chicago Blackhawks.

Jagr’s overtime goal on one good leg and one useless one against New Jersey.

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Washington Capitals forward Alex Ovechkin’s knee-on-knee hit on Sergei Gonchar.

Max Talbot’s one-sided, losing fight against Philadelphia’s Daniel Carcillo. “Shhhhh!”

A hockey playoff series often has a memorable moment, one that ratchets the intensity to a new, higher, often frightening level or swings the outcome toward one of the teams. There was another such moment in Game 3 of the Penguins-Washington series Monday night at PPG Paints Arena when Ovechkin and Capitals teammate Matt Niskanen worked over Sidney Crosby, leaving Crosby with a concussion that will force him to miss Game 4 Wednesday night at home. The Penguins still lead the series, 2-1, but, suddenly, without Crosby and injured Kris Letang, it feels as if it’s slipping away. I’m not sure I want to mention that to Mike Sullivan, though.

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“Listen, we’ve got a good hockey team here,” Sullivan fairly growled Tuesday. “We love the resiliency that this team shows in the face of adversity. They always respond the right way. There’s no doubt in my mind that we’ll do that again.”

Just in case, Sullivan should mention the Penguins’ surprising success over the years without Crosby. They are 101-56-19 without him, including playoffs, according to franchise historian Bob Grove. Sullivan also should mention how Evgeni Malkin has a history of raising his game without Crosby. He has averaged 1.32 points per game — 66 goals and 90 assists in 118 games — without Crosby. That doesn’t include his goal and assist Monday night after Crosby was knocked out in the first period.

“I think [Malkin] is an elite player,” Sullivan said. “He has that ability. We’re going to rely on him that much more. We believe he’ll get the job done for us.”

Of course, Sullivan will mention how no one player — not even Malkin — can carry all the load left by Crosby’s absence. He brought up Phil Kessel Tuesday. He didn’t have to bring up Marc-Andre Fleury, who has been spectacular in the series and in these playoffs. Everyone knows Fleury is the key to beating the Capitals.

“It’s a collective effort,” Sullivan said. “That’s the essence of a team.”

It wouldn’t hurt if Sullivan told his group about what happened to the 1992 Penguins after Graves’ slash broke a bone in Lemieux’s left hand in Game 2 of the Wales Conference semifinal. As with these Capitals, the Rangers were the Presidents’ Trophy winners that season. As with Crosby, Lemieux was the best player in the world.

“Hockey doesn’t need to lose a player like Mario Lemieux in an incident like this,” furious Penguins coach Scotty Bowman said.

The Penguins appeared to be in serious trouble after the Rangers won Games 2 and 3 to take a 2-1 lead in the series. But they responded to win Game 4 on Ron Francis’ three goals, including an overtime winner. They won Game 5 thanks to two goals by Jagr, including one on a penalty shot. And they won Game 6 behind 33 saves by Tom Barrasso to advance to the conference final against Boston.

“It was a very emotional room after that [Game 2],” Penguins forward Phil Bourque said years later. “We wanted to get back at Graves, do the same thing to him as he did to Mario. But we knew we couldn’t.

“It showed what our team was made of. Everybody thought the Rangers were going to win the Stanley Cup, especially after the Graves stuff. But we showed in that series why we deserve the rings on our fingers.”

Lemieux returned for Game 2 against the Bruins and had four goals and four assists in three games as the Penguins swept the series. He had five goals and two assists in the Cup final as they swept the Blackhawks. It was his amazing goal with 12.6 seconds left that won Game 1 after Jagr had tied it with his own amazing goal with 4:55 remaining.

Sullivan didn’t make any Stevens-like guarantees about these Penguins. You remember what Stevens said in 1991 after the Penguins lost the first two games against Boston in the Wales Conference final, right? “We’ll beat this team. I’ll say it right now, we’ll beat them.” The Penguins backed up Stevens’ big talk by winning the next four games to advance to the Cup final against Minnesota.

Sullivan stopped short of predicting such heroics against the Capitals. He also didn’t predict a Lemieux-like comeback by Crosby. But he didn’t rule either out.

“Sid’s very upbeat and he’s very positive.” Sullivan said. “We’re very optimistic. We’re hopeful that we’ll get him back in a timely fashion …

“This is just one more challenge that our team will face. We’ve had lots of them this season so we’ve had lots of practice at it. We’ve got character guys. We’ve got people we know we can win with.”

I’m convinced I made the right decision.

I’m glad I didn’t tell Sullivan the series is slipping away.

Ron Cook: rcook@post-gazette.com and Twitter@RonCookPG. Ron Cook can be heard on the “Cook and Poni” show weekdays from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on 93.7 The Fan.

First Published: May 3, 2017, 4:00 a.m.

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After Mario Lemieux, center, picked himself off the ice after being slashed by the New York Rangers' Adam Graves earlier in the playoffs, the Penguins captain picked up the Stanley Cup in 1992.  (ALL)
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