Sergei Gonchar’s return saved Penguins’ playoff run

The Pittsburgh Penguins’ season was slipping away and Sergei Gonchar couldn’t do anything about it, still recovering from a dislocated left shoulder as the calendar turned from January to February and the defending Eastern Conference champions flailed through what felt like a futile chase for a playoff spot.

“It’s probably one of the worst feelings I’ve had in my life as a hockey player, because that was the first injury in my life when I was out for such a long time,” said Gonchar, who was hurt in the team’s first exhibition game and needed surgery.

“Being out there, watching all those games and not being able to help your team, it’s one of the worst feelings. I didn’t know what was going to happen. I knew we had a good team, good group of guys, but unfortunately things weren’t going our way and I didn’t know where we were going to end up and how it was going to be.”

Neither did they.

The Penguins missed his dynamic shot from the blue line, his bread and butter in a career that includes five All-Star game appearances in 14 NHL seasons. They also missed his ability to quarterback the power play and turn a collection of superb talents into a focused, potent unit.

They didn’t realize, until he wasn’t there, that they weren’t as cohesive or confident without the Russian defenseman. They had come to depend on his leadership, to look for his cues and be calmed by his reassurance.

It’s no coincidence the Penguins reversed course soon after Gonchar rejoined the lineup in mid-February and General Manager Ray Shero replaced hard-driving Coach Michel Therrien with the more empathetic Dan Bylsma.

It’s also no coincidence that Gonchar had his most forceful and productive game of the Stanley Cup finals on Tuesday and that Pittsburgh won, 4-2, cutting the Detroit Red Wings’ lead to 2-1.

Gonchar assisted on the tying goal and scored the winner, both on power plays, infusing life into a team that had played decently in losing the first two games but needed real victories and not just moral ones.

It’s not the first time he has had a transformative effect on the Penguins, who can pull even tonight with a victory at Mellon Arena.

“I think we were about a .500 team without him,” Brooks Orpik, Gonchar’s defense partner, said Wednesday after the Penguins held a meeting and an optional skate.

“I think a lot of the defensemen were pushed into roles that they weren’t really all that comfortable with when he was out.

“It’s funny. He’s a really quiet guy, keeps to himself, a pretty private person. But when he is in the lineup, he just seems like he has a really calming influence on everybody.”

Gonchar has also been an inspiration in a sport in which fractures are brushed off as minor annoyances. (Who was surprised when Detroit defenseman Jonathan Ericsson had his appendix removed on a Wednesday and played a full and fully grueling game three days later to open the Cup finals?)

Gonchar is playing on one leg and a lot of hope after absorbing a dangerous knee-on-knee hit from Washington’s Alexander Ovechkin in Game 4 of the teams’ second-round playoff series. Immediate forecasts projected he’d be out two weeks.

He sat out only two games, returning for the Penguins’ Game 7 rout of the Capitals and playing at least 20 minutes in six of the next seven games.

Gonchar is wearing a brace to firm up his leg, but he’s strong enough that Bylsma in the last two games hasn’t dressed a seventh defenseman as insurance.

“At that time I really didn’t know what was going to happen. You know, the injury was there, and you never know how your body’s going to respond to it,” Gonchar said of the hit, which went unpunished by the NHL.

“So, you know, we took the approach when we look at it day to day, and I was fortunate enough that my body reacted well to the injury and I was able to recover and play the game again.”

The Penguins were fortunate too. He had an assist in their finale against the Capitals and two assists in their Eastern finals sweep of Carolina.

Gonchar has three goals and 14 points in the playoffs, including 11 points on the power play. That’s second only to teammate Evgeni Malkin’s 15 power-play points and could be a catalyst for the Penguins.

The Red Wings don’t take many penalties, but they’ve killed only 71.4% of the disadvantages they’ve faced. After converting two of three advantages on Tuesday, the Penguins are three for six for the series. Even if they can’t maintain that success rate they can do damage by scoring with the man advantage at crucial moments.

“Every chance is important, and I do believe that it’s one of the areas that we can have a chance to score on,” Gonchar said.

A healthy, effective Gonchar gives the Penguins a better than fighting chance of keeping these finals competitive.

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helene.elliott@latimes.com