The Red Wings started Greg Stefan in goal, while the Penguins countered with Tom Barasso.
Defenseman David Hannan opened the scoring with a goal for the Penguins 3:11 into the game with assists from Zarley Zalapski and John Cullen. Dan Quinn added to the Pittsburgh lead at 6:38 with an assist from Mario Lemieux. After ten scoreless minutes, Lemieux got another assist when he set up Cullen for the third Penguins goal with the second assist to James Johnson at 17:12. Exactly one minute later, the Red Wings fans were in despair as the Pittsburgh lead grew to 4-0 when Paul Coffey found the back of the net with assists from Quinn and Lemieux, his third of the period.
Lemieux had three assists in the first period
The second period was just over five minutes old when John Callander extended the Penguins advantage to 5-0 with an assist from Bob Errey and, of course, Lemieux. The rout was well and truly on less than a minute later when, at 6:06, Coffey converted with yet another assist to Lemieux, not only his fifth assist, but now with an assist on five consecutive goals, which we imagine would be an NHL record.
Lemieux had assists on five consecutive goals
The sixth Penguins goal was the end of the line for Stefan, who had given up the six goals on 16 shots for a save percentage of 0.625. Stefan was replaced by Glen Hanlon, who was probably not looking forward to facing an on-form Lemieux and a Pittsburgh team on a roll.
Petr Klima saved some face for the Red Wings just under two minutes later when he was set up by Rick Zombo with the second assist to Adam Oates at 7:54. Again, just under two minutes later, Steve Yzerman struck for Detroit at 9:51 with an assist to Lee Norwood. The goal was Yzerman's 56th on the year, breaking the Red Wings single season team record of 55 held by John Ogrodnick in 1984-85.
Yzerman set the Red Wings single season goal scoring record at 56
The Pittsburgh lead was cut in half at 12:39 when Paul MacLean lit the lamp with Gerard Gallant and Yzerman getting the assists. With four seconds left in a Detroit power play with Troy Loney off for hooking, Dave Barr made it 6-4 with assists from Oates and Norwood at 18:30, giving the Red Wings faithful hope that a real comeback was in the making.
At 4:28 of the third period, Chris Dahlquist was booked for tripping, putting Detroit back on the power play. This time, with just three seconds left in man advantage, Norwood converted at 6:25 from Yzerman and Gallant as the Penguins six goal lead had now melted to just one at 6-5, ratcheting up the tension at The Joe.
Yzerman had assists on goals 3 and 5
Detroit, now sensing they had Pittsburgh reeling, continued to pressure Barasso but their attack was interrupted by a hooking penalty to Gallant at 9:32, but 1:08 into the Pittsburgh power play, Zalapski was whistled for holding at 10:40. With an abbreviated power play once Gallant was freed, the Red Wings were unable to convert.
Finally, at the 15:00 minute mark, the Red Wings six goal comeback was complete when Yzerman sent the home fans into delirium when he scored to extend his Red Wings single season record to 57 goals with the assist going to Gallant, his third, and MacLean.
Yzerman tied the game with his second goal of the night
The teams both pressed for the game winner over the remaining five minutes of regulation plus an additional five minutes of overtime, but Barasso managed to hang on, while, somewhat unbelievably, with Stefan and Barasso both giving up six goals each, Hanlon did not allow a single goal in his 38:54 of action as the Red Wings defense only allowed the high powered Penguins 9 shots during Hanlon's time in goal as the game, clearly a tale of two halves, ended in a 6-6 tie.
Lemieux led all scorers with his five assists, followed by Yzerman with 2 goals and 2 assists as the fans got to see two NHL legends at their best that night. Norwood had a goal and two assists and Gallant had three helpers for Detroit. No one on Pittsburgh managed three points, but Coffey had two goals while Cullen and Quinn had a goal and an assist each. For the Red Wings, MacLean also had a goal and an assist, while Oates had a pair of assists.
Lemieux would go on to lead the NHL in goals, with 85, shorthanded goals with 13, assists with 114 and points with 199 while Yzerman finished 3rd in goals (65), assists (90) and points with 155.
Lemieux led the league in scoring in 1988-89
Today's featured jersey is a 1988-89 Pittsburgh Penguins Mario Lemieux jersey as worn the night Lemieux assisted on five consecutive Penguins goals.
The Penguins took the unusual step of introducing their new black and gold jerseys during the 1979-80 season. With both the Pittsburgh Steelers of the NFL and the Pittsburgh Pirates of Major League Baseball having won championships for Pittsburgh wearing the black and gold colors of the city flag, the Penguins changed from their navy blue and Columbia blue color scheme to their new jerseys midseason.
The jerseys did undergo some tweaking during their initial run of use, such as the relocation of the sleeve numbers from the shoulders to the sleeves and some changes in fonts for both the names and numbers, as well as the straightening of the angles arm striping, which concluded with back-to-back Stanley Cup championships in 1991 and 1992, only to have the team drop their by now classic and successful jerseys after 11 1/2 seasons!
While the new jerseys retained the black and gold colors, the club eventually changed the vibrant gold to a pale "Las Vegas Gold" in 2000-01 for their new alternate jersey, which became their primary jersey in 2002-03.
Today's bonus jersey style returned as a retro alternate jersey for 2014-15 before once again becoming the primary home jersey starting with the 2016-17 season for hopefully a longer run than the first time out for one of the league's most attractive designs.
Today's second featured jersey is a 1988-89 Detroit Red Wings Steve Yzerman jersey as worn the night Detroit came from six goals down for a tie as Yzerman set the Red Wings single season goal scoring record, which he would eventually extend to 65 goals as part of his franchise single season point record of 155.
From 1932 to 1934, the Red Wings only wore red sweaters for both home and road games, with the white jersey not being introduced until the 1934-35 season. The next real change of note was the addition of red sleeves decorated with sleeve numbers for the first time in 1961, as seen on today's bonus jersey. Names would not appear until 1973 with only changes to fonts for the name and numbers since, including the vertically arched names arriving in 1982-83.
In today's video section, the thoughts of both Yzerman and Lemieux when they were linemates during the 1983 World Junior Championships.
Next, Yzerman with a ridiculous solo effort from 1989 that simply has to be seen to be believed.
Here, a Top 10 Yzerman Goals highlight reel from TSN, which somehow failed to include the above goal, but still a worthy collection of Yzerman's skills for certain.
In the interests of equal time, a look at Lemieux and the Penguins 1988-89 season in three parts.
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