DETROIT -- Everyone knows that Pavel Datsyuk is some kind of wizard.
Datsyuk proved it again in Thursday night's 4-3 victory over the Carolina Hurricanes.
After the Hurricanes had tied the game at 2, they then had a two-man advantage for 96 seconds.
They called a timeout to prepare.
But there's only so much you can do against a determined Datsyuk.
Datsyuk managed to get the puck and played a game of keep-away pretty much by himself.
"That’s Pavel for you right there," captain Henrik Zetterberg said. "He can play both sides of the ice and it’s fun to see him. Me and Kronner (Niklas Kronwall) were just standing there just inside our own blue line and rested when Pavel had the puck for 30 seconds, I think."
Datsyuk was as good a friend to goaltender Jonas Gustavsson during that time.
"Games like this, especially when things have been going tough for us, they could have easily scored a goal 5-on-3, but he pretty much killed it by himself," Gustavsson said. "It was huge. Instead of being down a goal, we took the momentum and scored later."
Gustav Nyquist, who helped take the scoring burden off of Datsyuk with his two goals, said Datsyuk doesn't get enough credit for his defensive prowess.
"That was unbelievable to see," Nyquist said. "Whatever he does, I feel like he’s best at pretty much all of it so you know he made some great plays there, he kept the puck away from them for over a minute, I felt like, so everyone talks about his moves and how great offensively he is but I think defensively he’s unbelievable as well."
Unfortunately for Datsyuk, despite the impressive kill, he finished minus-3 for the game.
