Lately, some wise and extremely knowledgeable hockey pals have voiced very legitimate concerns about our Penguins and their chances to repeat as Stanley Cup champions.
I’m sure they’re not the only ones in Penguins Nation to doubt. So, with all due respect, I thought I’d respond in kind of an open-letter style.
First off, let me say I do understand your discomfort. Believe me, I do. The elevated shot totals against, game in and game out, certainly are a cause for worry.
Personally, I have an almost pathological unease over our lack of size. Especially on defense. Which I feel contributes greatly to our difficulty in clearing the puck from our zone. Thus, the untidy sum of shots against.
Indeed, our games tend to morph into on-ice track meets these days. Which I don’t think is at all what coach Mike Sullivan means by “playing the right way.”
However, “Sully” is practical enough to understand just how banged up his team is right now. And, to expect perfection from his present group, would be folly.
Nor do I think we’re quite giving credit where credit is due. Going into Sunday’s action, we’re three points off the overall NHL lead. Let that sink in for a moment. Three points.
Now, envision the following lineup with me:
Center—Crosby, Malkin, Bonino, Cullen
Left Wing—Guentzel, Hagelin, Kunitz, Wilson/Kuhnhackl
Right Wing—Sheary, Kessel, Hornqvist, Rust
Defense—Schultz, Cole, Dumoulin, Daley, Streit, Hainsey/Maatta
Goal—Murray, Fleury
It goes without saying the Pens should get quite a boost when everyone returns. “Hidden vigorish,” as the ol’ Gunner, Bob Prince used to say.
I’m not even including Kris Letang in the defensive mix for now, because no one associated with the team is saying boo about him. Even without “Tanger,” it’s a pretty imposing bunch.
Mind you, I’m not promising a Stanley Cup. And I know what you mean about this season not having the same feel as last year.
While hindsight is 20/20, a lot of us could sense something special was building last spring. We followed our Cup-winning formula of calamity, coaching change and resurrection right down the line. With a big trade or two thrown in.
Know what this season reminds me of? The Pens’ second Cup year in ’92. We faced a loaded, and I mean loaded, Washington team in the first round of the playoffs. Peter Bondra, Dino Ciccarelli, Kevin Hatcher, Dale Hunter, Al Iafrate, Calle Johansson, Rod Langway and Michal Pivonka. As big, tough and mean as they were good.
The Pens fell behind 3 games to 1. They lost Game 4, 7-2. Ciccarelli scored four goals in that one. Break out the golf clubs, boys. It looked like early tee times for sure.
Then Ron Francis and Mario Lemieux hatched a scheme—with coach Scotty Bowman’s blessing—to employ the 1-4 delay. We won three straight.
Next up, the New York Rangers. Presidents’ Trophy winners. Three Hall-of-Famers, including Captain Courageous Mark Messier. Five 30-goal scorers. Even bigger and badder than the Caps.
The Pens win Game 1 and are up in Game 2. Then Adam Graves breaks Mario’s hand with a slash and Kris King destroys Joey Mullen, tearing up his knee. Scratch two 40-goal scorers.
New York takes Games 2 and 3 and has us on the ropes in Game 4. Just when things couldn’t be bleaker, farmhand Mike Needham—a ‘90s version of Josh Archibald—scores a huge goal.
We rally from the brink to win Game 4. And the series. And, eventually, the Cup.
If all this has a familiar ring, it should. The present-day Washington Capitals and Columbus Blue Jackets remind me an awful lot of those ’92 Caps and Rangers. In similar fashion, we’ll likely have to go through one, if not both, just to get to the Finals.
Lord knows, it won’t be easy.
Out west, Chicago reminds me more of us than we do right now. A dynamic blend of skill and speed. The Blackhawks have been there before. They know what it takes to prevail.
Call me a cockeyed optimist. Despite the inherent obstacles, I believe our guys possess the heart, talent and resilience to rise above and repeat. Just like that ’91-92 team.
Believe.
Hey all
We really needed a win tonight.That is 4 big points in the last 3 games that we let slip thru our fingers.Ouch.
9 give aways tonight. Out hit. Matt Cullen is a minus 3 .
Break downs all over. This is not play off caliber hockey.
On paper our team looks good.On the ice against elite opposition. ??
As I said below…It is not going to get any easier playing Chicago. Really is going to be hard to finish first in the metro now.
Saying a prayer for our boys tonight.
☺
Hello to All,
My two cents. I had misgivings last year too. Much the same as I have this year, though once they got past the Caps, last year, I was pretty convinced they’d take it all.
This year, I still sweat their lack of size, but they are a gritty bunch. However, I just can’t get my head around this D holding up for 16 games unless everyone of them kicks it into another gear and puts more focus on shut down mode. There’s no way, absent that focus, they weather spending more than half the game in their own zone against the Caps, or Columbus. That’s long-term beatings they aren’t built to take.
But, my other “biggest” concern is officiating, of all things, and for the very reason the Other Rick mentions. I don’t want to rant here, because that’s a discussion for another time, but the one thing I have disliked most about this sport — for at least 30 of the 50 years I’ve been a fan — is the generally accepted notion that it’s even remotely okay for officiating to attempt to make the game competitive. As if the players aren’t capable of that on their own. But, we will see a lot of that via calls, and non-calls, just like always. — 55, biting his tongue and wanting to rant.
Hey 55
Good point about the boys in stripes.
Do not worry about ranting, if we only get
one more we will have a quartet and then
we can our own “Curling team”.
Good to hear from you 55.
Hey Rick,
We play the Fylers, Blackhawks,Bluejackets, Rangers and yes even Toronto with all their star kids before we get to the play offs. New Jersey and Carolina because of the Shero and Jimmy R. connections always play us very tough as well.( They really want to beat us badly.) There are no easy victories left in our season. This is not an ideal schedule by any stretch of the imagination.
My media sources say that indeed the Pen’s want to finish ahead of both Washington and Columbus so they will draw an easier opponent in the first round. In my opinion in order to achieve this we must play all our best players, 100 % in every game until the end of the season to have any hope of finishing first over all. If you really want to finish ahead of Washington and Columbus, there is no other way ! They are simply to good to take lightly.
There will be no rest for Crosby, Kessel Schultz and Cole. This is not a good situation to be in. Both Washington and Columbus have easier schedules than we do. It will be a very tough journey this next 15- 18 days.
Plus my biggest fear is that because of lack of Cup caliber players we will rush back our injured players to soon because management and ownership realize that both Columbus and Washington, if they are healthy can beat us in our injured state. Exit first round !!! So they may spend all their energy trying to win the battle, but soon after lose the war.
Sid wants to win another Rocket Richard trophy and is still chasing McDavid for the total points leader and he is never going to come out and rest in the final 8 games. This is his last chance at a career moment.
I do not blame him.
If I were the Pen’s, I would rest all my star players and lose 5 out of 8 remaining games and be content to battle Columbus with a well rested squad. Round 1 could be the toughest opponent we will face in the chase for the cup in 2017.
So yes my friend I do believe….. but I am terrified that in our quest to finish first overall and Crosby’s personal records chase, we are going to pay the price of losing in the first round if we do not win the Presidents trophy.
I really hope I am wrong again. 🙂
Cheers
Hey Jim,
A couple things;
First, I understand the idea of wanting to finish first in the division so that we can avoid Was and CBJ in the first round. The sad part of the Metro Div is that at least 1 very good team is going to get a first round exit even though they don’t deserve it. However, I with albatross that the President’s Trophy always seems to bring with it, I would hope that Chi or someone else would beat us out as the overall number 1 team.
Second, like you, I would rather try and give some of the big guns extra rest over these last few games.
Third, One of the great things about last year was the commitment to team over personal glory, I would hope that Sid would rather hoist the Cup for a thrid time rather than win a Rocket Richard trophy. Personally, I would have rather seen Sullie give Murray enough games to be given a shot at the Calder (look back and compare his stats to say a Tony O who is consider to have had the best rookie capmaign; Murray doesn’t look all that shabby, except in GP). However, if the lower workload he received this year, despite all of his accomplishments that should have bought him a 60 or more GP this year, makes him hungry for another Cup this year I gladly take it. (Not to mention I like MAF and really pull for him to finish his Pens days out as a winner).
Finally, should Sullie take our advice (Heaven help the Pens if he ever really starts using us as his advisors 🙂 ), I would rather see him do it now and have the playoff roster play the last 5 games together again to try and get on a roll.
Hey Rick,
Please understand that I believe in Sullivan and if anyone can find a way to elevate this team’s he can. Also, I cannot argue that this team boasts the greatest assembly of affensive talent in the game today; their stats, even as injury deleted as they are reflet this, with possibly more to come by way of Sprong and Aston-Reese. So when all the forwards get back, even Holtby and Dubanyk must lose sleep. Lets not forget that they chased Holtby from a game this year already and he is fighting Dubanyk for the Vezina. This team has a history of breaking the best goalies, when the refs call the game as it was written.
Unfortunately, lets remember that most referees prefer to dictate the outcome of games via non-calls rather than actually call the game correctly, so obstruction pentalties will slow down this high octane offense come playoff time. Unless the team starts learning how to play defense and starts cutting down shots against themselves the odds will get longer and longer this year.
As enamoured as I am of our Forwards and Goalies, I am less than thrilled at the list of D men you paraded out. As I mentioned in an earlier comment, the only D men that I would be disposed of keeping this off-season are Schultz and Cole. Even Letang has had a weak season and I amount just talking about his injuries. He has not played like the Letang that dominated in the play-offs last year.
As I said yesterday, I am channeling my inner Fox Mulder, “I really want to believe”. I don’t want to be a Negative Nellie. I like Letang, Maatta, Daley, Domoulin, and Ruhwedel. I want them to succeed. I want them to step it up. I want newcomers like Streit and Hainsey to be reasonable facsimiles of Daley and Lovejoy from last year. I am sorry, I haven’t seen anything from them yet to make me believe they will step it up.
I would be overjoyed if they did turn it around. I want to see some sign for me to jump on the bandwagon this year. I would love to have to post a “I was wrong comment”
And that is why I say, “GO PENS!!!!!!!!”
Wow more typos, I have to start double checking before I post.
Sorry
That’s okay.
I initially forgot to include Hagelin among the left wings … 🙁
Rick
Hey Rick, i like where you are going with this and wow, that is an impressive team on paper. Hopefully they will be healthy. The Pens managed to find out a lot about themselves last year during a similar stretch without Malkin.
I know bigger is better, and I hate watching our smaller team get beat up night after night, but there is a stat hidden in all that smallness. The four smallest teams in the NHL are the Penguins, Canucks, Bruins & Blackhawks. In that group is six of the last eight Stanley Cup winners.