One of the myriad of problems that plagued the Pittsburgh Penguins last season was a lack of killer instinct. Last season’s rendition of our beloved black-n-gold would often lose to teams that they should have beaten. Last night they took on a Columbus Blue Jackets’ team, defanged over the off-season due to Free Agent (FA) defections (Sergei Bobrovsky, Matt Duchene, and Artemi Panarin) and coming in on the back end of a back-to-back series. They (the Blue Jackets) were ripe for the picking, and unlike last year, this year’s Penguins did reap the harvest.
Last season’s incarnation of Pittsburgh’s Hockey club lacked a killer’s instinct. Even when they would take the lead on teams and looked like they had their opponents on the ropes, they would let them up and either lose outright or at least cede 1 point to the other team by waiting until Over Time (OT) or Shoot Out (SO) to win. Last night, in the 2nd period, they began to look like sharks at a feeding frenzy.
Question, was this a Pyrrhic victory?
Right before our locals found their scoring touch again, Evgeni Malkin burning with the fire that had him ripping his team after their last loss, charged through the neutral zone only to have teammate Kris Letang trip him up and send him awkwardly into the boards on his knees. As the big bear of a Center skidded toward the boards, fellow Russian Vladislav Gavrikov, playing Defense for the Blue Jackets, threw his shoulder into him (Malkin). The Assistant Captain did not return.
Hopefully, Malkin wasn’t hurt that bad and that his absence the rest of the game was just a precaution, since the team was finding themselves.
Along with the Penguins’ second line Center, Malkin, our seafaring sphenisciformes lost their 3rd line Center during the game as well. Nick Bjugstad left the ice at 6:35 of the 3rd period with an undisclosed injury and didn’t return.
Hopefully, neither of our boys-of-winters’ Centers will be absent for next game. Due to administrative (Cap) issues on this team, they have precious little maneuver room. The team went into the regular season carry no reserve forwards and 9 Defensemen but with 23 players on the roster (the maximum allowed).
The problem the team may face Tuesday against the Winnipeg Jets, if neither player is able to play that night nor suffering a long term injury, is how to replace them (Malkin and Bjugstad) in the lineup. Only John Marino is waiver exempt. Coach Mike Sullivan may have to either risk exposing a player to waivers to bring up 2 forwards to bolster a depleted roster or play with 7 Defensemen.
Now that I think about it, I have another question, why can’t this team stand prosperity? Why do they always seem to need adversity to come together?
While we are at it, kudos to team Captain, Sidney Crosby for standing up to the Blue Jacket Bullies. Late in the 2nd period, the Jackets, Pierre-Luc DuBois decided to hit Jake Guentzel with his shoulder high, near the Penguins’ wingers head. Captain Crosby got the number of that offender, so that when DuBois, emboldened by the referees’ lack of notice, cross-checked Guentzel’s Captain and pivot man, Crosby dropped his gloves immediately and showed the Jacket Defenseman that he wasn’t going to sit idly by while liberties were taken with his team. In a show of strength and an interesting scrum, where few punches were thrown, Crosby twisted his opponent around and around, finally into a ball, and threw him on the ice.
When the final tick struck on the game clock, 4 Penguins’ forwards had multi-point nights; Jared McCann led the way with 2 Goals and 1 Assist. Captain Crosby, Patric Hornqvist and newcomer Alex Galchenyuk picked up 2 points each as our favorite flightless fowl found the back of the net for a full touchdown, 7 goals.
Yes there were some concerns other than the injuries, particularly in that first frame, like several opposing forwards getting behind the defense, and Columbus managing 30 shots on goal, but even deprived of their assistant Captain Malkin and 3rd line Center Bjugstad, our aquatic avians seemed to get stronger as the game went along and the team did what they were supposed to do; put away a team that they should have and need to.
Odds and Sods
The Wilkes Barre – Scranton Penguins with their new Head Coach Mike Vellucci started the season off with a win over the Hershey Bears 4 – 3. Prospects Anthony Angello and Jake Lucchini scored Goals. Angello scored the game winner. Other Prospects; Niclas Almari, Kevin Czuczman, Ryan Haggerty, Adam Johnson, Oula Palve, and David Warsovsky found the score sheet as well. Johnson picked up 2 Assists to lead that group. Casey DeSmith stopped 36 of 39 shots to back stop the Baby Penguins to a victory.
Next up Winnipeg Jets Tuesday night, 7:00PM at PPG Paints Arena
Go Pens!!
Update,
Malkin and Bjugstad are out “Longer Term” and the team has to call up 2 Fs.
Hmm…. well, will they now lose a defenseman to the waiver wire? or trade one?
Or is one of those injuries serious enough for IR?
My first thought was to send Tanger and Johnson down to WBS, but I sense their contracts forbid that. That was a good idea for the 10 seconds it lasted.
LOL
Risking 3 and 58 to the waiver wire? Interesting thought.
Marino down, Letang to wing??
Hey tOR,
The Pens looked good. Way better than Thursday, when they came out flat. Buffalo downed Jersey 7-2 so they’re not a pushover. I believe the Pens just didn’t have enough playing time as a team before Thursday.
The Pens looked the way they looked during the Cup years on Saturday, completely tiring out the Jackets defense by keeping the puck in the offensive zone for long periods of time, then capitalizing on the BJ’s tired defense.
Give them a few games, this is the best and hungriest Penguins lineup I have seen since the 1990 cup winning Pens. Crosby, Malkin, Guentzel, Mccann, Galchenyuk, Bjugstad can steal the show on any given night and maybe even possibly Tanev or Kahun. The supporting crew to those guys is damn impressive also.
Defense is questionable, but there are many teams with way worse. The Pens also have Marino & Rikola that are unknown commodities in the wings that are forcing the main 6 to show up every shift or they will be benched.
Should be a fun season to watch.
Hey Phil,
It was good to see our Pens finally bury a team again, bury a team that they should have buried. However, in that same vein, I am going to be a little tepid in my excitement. Columbus is a FA depleted and was coming on the back-end of a back-to-back.
I am not going to argue with you that the team could get really exciting. I saw somethings in the preseason and in the way the team came together after Malkin went down that surely suggests that you may be right. Maybe it was a wake up call for a team lost in a nightmare.
I do think this team has some players in the org. I think they could make noise this year, if the right players get the chance.
With all due respect to Mike, I do think that Riikola should be playing over Johnson. Yes he was a +3 last game but it was a tired team with little offensive talent left. Not only did they lose Duchene and Panarin to FA but Dubinsky was injured. Those are names that aren’t easily replaced.
However, I do think that Letang is the worst of the worst defensively. Once CBJ had to play chase he did look as bad defensively, but let’s not forget in the first period he sent a Jacket in for a break away.
I know it won’t happen but Marino may be a better choice on the right side.
I also am pretty darn sure that A Johnson, Lafferty, and Bjorkqvist all totally trump Simon. Even on Crosby’s line he can’t find his way on to the score sheet when Crosby notches a pair of assists and the team notches 7 goals.
I will say this, I concede that my fears of Tanev may have been unfounded. I do like the way he looks on Malkin’s line. He does create a lot of havoc and opens up a ton of ice.
But again, I will hold my final assessment until the Pens play a couple of top tier teams. The Pens had a really sweet sweep of a road trip early on last year, including a 9-1 dowsing of the Flames (10/25/19) and then they collapsed.
Interesting, just saw that Dan Kingarski (2 hrs ago) is now contemplating what I wrote after the Dismantling of the Jackets; what will the Penguins do if both Malkin and Bjugstad are no-goes?
Hopefully, Malkin was only held out of the last period because the team was in complete control.
Mike, I hope you don’t read Dan’s article, although he doesn’t share a lot of peoples disrespect for J Johnson, he does still ponder the probability of that trade. He doesn’t seem to believe the talk from JR or JJ to poor water on the fire of those rumors.
Hey tOR,
Don’t know who Kingarski is, but I’m pretty sure Malkin has a groin pull and was held out because like you said they were in control.
Hey Phil,
I really didn’t see anything really bad on the play and was somewhat surprised not to see him come back out, that is until I looked at the scoreboard.
Do you have any info on Bjugstad?
Kingarski hasn’t seen the light to come to our blog, he writes elsewhere. From what I read, he wasn’t sure what happened to either and was just musing about what would happen if Malkin’s injury (as you say a groin pull) might be nagging, same with Bjugstad, where neither were IR candidates. In that situation, the team could only move Marino down without sending him through waivers, so they would have to either play with 7 D or risk a player, like I wrote above. Basically, Kingarski was a day late and a dollar short, I had already thought about it.
I hope both Malkin and Bjugstad are ready for tomorrow, I didn’t really pay close attention to the Jets in the Preseason, so I don’t know they are playing without Trouba, but I would think that they are more than a little better than CBJ.
Didn’t see anything happen to Bjugstad, maybe he just re-injured his nagging lower body (groin pull) injury from pre-season.