Islanders Too Much for Jarry, Penguins

“The Islanders are like a disease that you can’t get rid of.”

That unflattering but wholly accurate assessment of the New Yorkers was uttered by Penguins winger Bob “Battleship” Kelly during the infamous 1975 Quarter-Finals round series between the clubs.

Truer words were never spoken.

Still, I confess to being happy when we drew the Islanders as our first-round opponent. After all, we had our way with them during the regular season. In my humble opinion, we had Semyon Varlamov in our hip pocket. And I thought our speed and scoring depth would be telling.

Before Ilya Sorokin. Before the dark times.

I also thought we’d be okay with Tristan Jarry in goal. How wrong I was.

I don’t mean to be harsh. Lord knows, probably nobody feels worse than Tristan does right now. And I’ll stop short of espousing a knee-jerk reaction and blaming him for losing Games 5 and 6. After reviewing the Islanders goals, he had plenty of help in the culpability department.

Still, Jarry pretty much imploded at the worst possible time.

Who would’ve thought that of all the injuries we endured, Casey DeSmith’s might’ve been the most critical? Had Casey been healthy, I would’ve been sorely tempted to turn to him after the Islanders second goal when Jarry appeared to be shaky. Certainly after the fourth, when we still had a fighting chance. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

I was so proud of our guys for the way they came firing out of the gate. Eighty-seven seconds in Kasperi Kapanen burst into the Islanders’ zone and fed Jeff Carter, who beat Sorokin stick side. The perfect way to respond to the crushing double OT loss and set the tone for the night.

It took the Isles less than four minutes to respond. With Kris Letang drifting in the neutral zone, Anthony Beauvillier streaked around Sidney Crosby and beat Jarry with a nifty backhander high to the glove side. In the process establishing a call-and-respond pattern that would extend into the second period.

The Pens would score and the Isles would counter. Kind of an on-ice version of anything you can do I can do better.

We reclaimed the lead at 11:12, as battered, bruised and slump-riddled Jake Guentzel finally broke through with a power-play tally from the high slot. A scant 73 seconds later the Islanders countered. Kyle Palmieri evaded the attention of Cody Ceci and converted a made-to-order rebound off Jarry’s right pad.

In a last shining display of the marvelous resilience that carried us to a division title, we struck for a third and final time at 1:53 of the second period. Atoning for his earlier gaffe, Ceci gathered in a short pass from Evgeni Malkin and fired a hard shot on net from the right circle. Jason Zucker arrived as Johnny-on-the-spot to deflect the rubber past Sorokin, giving us a 3-2 lead and a huge emotional lift.

For the next several minutes I dared dream that we just might pull this one out and force a Game 7. Then the roof caved in.

At 8:35, Josh Bailey found Brock Nelson cruising all alone in the left circle with a slap pass. Having escaped the attention of Ceci and lagging backchecker Bryan Rust, Nelson ripped the puck past Jarry, who proceeded to melt down.

Thirteen seconds later the beleaguered netminder barely flinched as Ryan Pulock beat him with a long-range blast through heavy traffic. In the blink of an eye a 3-2 lead had morphed into a 4-3 deficit.

At this stage, I would’ve called a timeout and seriously considered replacing Jarry, in obvious distress, with Maxime Lagace. Maybe it would’ve made a difference and maybe not, given Lagace’s checkered past. It all became moot three minutes later when Nelson pushed back a collapsing black-and-gold defense and beat Jarry through the five-hole. At this point our chances for a comeback pretty much went up in smoke.

To our credit we kept battling. Our guys pressed furiously to open the final period, but simply couldn’t beat Sorokin. Any last-ditch hope evaporated at 15:16 when John Marino drew a double-minor for high-sticking Matt Martin.

I felt such a mixture of emotions in those closing moments. Badly for the magnificent core that won us three Stanley Cups. But time marches on. And while you never say never, it appears for all the world that our Stanley Cup window has closed. Emphatically so.

The real disappointment? I truly felt this team had a chance. Okay, maybe a Cup was wishful thinking. And maybe the Bruins would’ve swept us four straight in the next round. But I thought we were at least good enough to go a couple of rounds and make some noise.

However, a chain is only as strong as its weakest link. That goes for a hockey team as well. Last night our weakest link was exposed.

Speaking of Weak Links…

Jarry wasn’t the only Penguin to struggle. I thought Mike Matheson, to be kind, had a brutal game defensively. He was a minus-two and victimized on numerous occasions, not to mention four Islanders scoring plays. Ceci, so solid during the regular season, wasn’t much better. He also finished a minus-two, as did Letang and Brian Dumoulin.

In general, I thought our defense had a difficult series, which no doubt contributed to Jarry’s woes.

Combined with an increasing need to shelter Marcus Pettersson and Marino’s sophomore regression? An area ripe for retooling over the offseason.

Puckpourri

The Pens again won the stat battle but lost the war. We outshot the Islanders, 37-24, and outhit them as well. Five-on-five, we had a pronounced edge in Corsi events (71-41), scoring chances (28-19) and high danger chances (8-5).

Zucker (a goal and a helper) and Malkin (two assists) paced the black and gold with two points each. In particular, I thought Geno played a terrific game.

Kapanen and Zucker led the way with a plus-two each. On the flip side, the Crosby line was a combined minus-10, including a team-worst minus-four for Guentzel.

Jarry stopped 19 of 24 shots for a .792 save percentage. For the series, Tristan posted a 3.18 goals against average and an .888 save percentage. His quality starts percentage? An abysmal .167.

Around the League

Defending Cup champ Tampa Bay advanced to the second round, beating Florida, 4-0. Minnesota shutout Vegas, 3-0, to force a Game 7.