Several minutes after Crosby slid on his stomach across the crease to punch away Anton Volchenkov's shot as it lay inches from the goal line, Crosby began cycling the puck by himself behind the Ottawa net. Looking for an opening to pass or to dart out and take a shot, he crossed the goalie trapezoid three times before finally carrying the puck out and, sliding to the ice, feeding it to Letang at the right point.
Letang's shot with 4:12 left beat goalie Brian Elliott, who made 29 saves but didn't get any support after Peter Regin scored on the Senators' first shot 18 seconds into the game. Penguins goalie Marc-Andre Fleury shook off that goal and a poor first game to turn aside Ottawa's next 19 shots.
Devin Setoguchi deflected in a loose puck for a power-play goal 5:32 into overtime and San Jose rallied to even the Western Conference series.
Joe Pavelski tied it for the Sharks with 31.3 seconds left in regulation and goalie Evgeni Nabokov off for an extra attacker, and Setoguchi won it with his second goal of the game with Adam Foote in the penalty box for Colorado for interference.
The Sharks avoided dropping the first two games at home for a third straight playoff series. The series shifts to Denver for Games 3 and 4 beginning Sunday night.
Nabokov earned his fifth overtime win in 13 playoff games. He allowed five goals on the first 13 shots he faced, getting mock applause when he stopped an easy dump-in midway through the third period.
Ron Blake, Manny Malhotra and Scott Nichol also scored for San Jose.
Chris Stewart had two goals, and Kyle Cumiskey, Milan Hejduk and Brandon Yip also scored for Colorado.
Dainius Zubrus scored on a rebound with 4:04 to play and New Jersey beat Philadelphia to tie the Eastern Conference series at a game apiece.
Zach Parise, Colin White, Andy Greene and Ilya Kovalchuk also scored and Martin Brodeur stopped 26 shots to help New Jersey avoid the death sentence of losing the first two games at home in the best-of-7 series.
Aaron Asham, Claude Giroux and Chris Pronger scored for the Flyers, headed home for Games 3 and 4 on Sunday and Tuesday.
Brian Boucher had no chance on Zubrus' goal. Zubrus powered his way around the net and sent a shot on goal that the goalie stopped. Parise and Zubrus both swung at the rebound and the puck went into the net. Kovalchuk added an empty-net goal.
J.P. Dumont scored twice in the final period and the Nashville Predators won for the first time on the road in the playoffs, rallying to beat the Chicago Blackhawks 4-1 on Friday night in the Western Conference quarterfinal opener.
It was Nashville's first road playoff win in 11 tries and it was a dramatic one with former Blackhawk Dumont burning his former team in the third.
Pekka Rinne made 25 saves in his playoff debut for the Predators, allowing only Patrick Kane's second-period goal. After Dumont gave Nashville a 2-1 lead, Jerred Smithson and Martin Erat added empty-net goals in the final 48 seconds.
Nashville's David Legwand got the puck after a turnover by Chicago's Troy Brouwer, raced in and took a shot that Antti Niemi stopped, but Dumont was there to knock in the rebound to give the Predators a 2-1 lead at 10:37 of the final period.
Henrik Zetterberg scored three goals, including the winner with 6:06 left, and Detroit beat Phoenix to tie the Western Conference series 1-1.
Zetterberg scored the deciding goal when he gathered a rebound off a shot by Todd Bertuzzi and fed it into an open net. He added an empty-net goal with 47 seconds left.
Linemate Valtteri Filppula scored twice and Justin Abdelkader and Pavel Datsyuk added goals for Detroit. Shane Doan, Matthew Lombardi, Wojtek Wolski and Keith Yandle scored for Phoenix. Game 3 is Sunday in Detroit.
