With 5:35 left in the first period Wednesday, the Mellon Arena scoreboard showed a clip from the movie "Miracle."
Exactly three minutes later, a real miracle occurred.
The Penguins scored.
It had been a while -- 153 minutes, 22 seconds, going back to the third period of Game 5 against the Flyers.
The Penguins were whitewashed in the first two games of this Stanley Cup final, unable to beat Detroit Red Wings goaltender Chris Osgood. Or really test him, for that matter.
Osgood's shutouts marked the first time the Penguins had been blanked in back-to-back games since February 2003 -- a stretch of 400 games, including playoffs.
Sidney Crosby changed all that.
With former U.S. Olympic hockey hero Mike Eruzione (winning goal, Miracle on Ice) watching from the crowd, Crosby beat Osgood at 17:25 of the first period to give the Penguins a 1-0 lead.
"It was just, 'Finally,'" Crosby said. "It wasn't like there weren't chances. It felt good to get the first one."
The goal got the Penguins and the crowd going in what would become a 3-2 victory. Crosby scored twice.
Detroit carried the play early, recording nine of the first 10 shots. The Penguins gained some life when coach Michel Therrien put Crosby with Evgeni Malkin and Marian Hossa.
A few minutes later, Crosby scored.
"We talked about it before the game -- if we got one goal, we're going to get more," Hossa said. "That gave us confidence, and we knew we could score again."
The play started innocently enough, with the Red Wings running a set breakout from behind their net.
Defenseman Brad Stuart came out to his right and looked to pass but appeared to be thrown off as Crosby circled in front of him.
Stuart snapped an errant pass off the skate of teammate Henrik Zetterberg. Crosby gained possession and flipped a quick drop pass to Hossa, who tried to shoot. The puck deflected off Stuart's skate to Crosby, who did not hesitate in one-timing a shot through Osgood's pads.
"Turnover by us," Zetterberg said. "They really took advantage of that. To that point, I think we played a good first period. That got momentum on their side."
As the puck crossed the line, defenseman Nicklas Lidstrom sent Crosby spinning in mid-air. Crosby fairly bounced off the ice and started celebrating with teammate Jarkko Ruutu as the crowd of 17,132 roared.
"It's great to see our captain, our leader, have a huge game like that," Hossa said. "When we see that, we follow him."
Some observers wondered if Therrien would try to keep Crosby away from the Wings' top defense pair -- Lidstrom and Brian Rafalski -- and the line of Zetterberg, Pavel Datsyuk and Tomas Holmstrom.
"I don't mind that matchup against Zetterberg and Datsyuk," Therrien said before the game. "Crosby is one of the best players, if not the best player, in the league. So you think I mind?"
First goals usually portend victory in the NHL. The Penguins and Red Wings are evidence of that. The Penguins had been 10-0 when scoring first in the playoffs, 2-4 when they did not. The Red Wings were 12-1, 2-3.
Despite some hairy moments in the final minutes, as the Penguins clung to their lead, the pattern held.
