Over the course of a long, 82-game season, a hockey team will encounter just about every situation imaginable. During the early going, our Penguins perfected the art of starting at a snail’s pace before coming on like gangbusters.
Well, during last night’s ugly 6-3 loss to the Oilers at Rogers Place, the polar opposite occurred. Spurred by coach Mike Sullivan and his staff, the Pens started the game in top gear before experiencing a total meltdown. Culminating in a disastrous second period that saw us yield 24 shots on goal, four of which tickled the twine behind our beleaguered goalie Tristan Jarry.
More on that in a bit.
Speedy Zach Hyman opened the scoring for the Oilers at 4:36 of the first period. Taking a perfect lead pass from defenseman Evan Bouchard, he got behind Kris Letang and beat Jarry on a breakaway.
Working on a power play, the Pens knotted the score at 1-1 mid-period. Rickard Rakell, arguably our best player on the night, teed up a feed from Jason Zucker and ripped a shot off the far post and over Jack Campbell’s glove hand.
Less than two minutes later we snagged a 2-1 lead, again courtesy of Rakell. The Swedish winger made a strong play to protect the puck with his body before slipping a crisp trans-slot pass to Sidney Crosby. Sid did the rest, beating Campbell from below the right circle for his fourth goal of the season.
The Pens made it 3-1 two minutes into the second period off a three-man rush by the Evgeni Malkin line. With Zucker planted in the crease, Bryan Rust swung behind the net and bounced the puck in off Campbell’s back in classic Mario Lemieux fashion.
Unfortunately, that was the end of black-and-gold heroics. Things began to unravel when ex-Oiler Jeff Petry sent supernova Connor McDavid sprawling back-first in a goal post. Tyson Barrie struck on the ensuing power play to pare our lead to one.
Then the Oilers completely took over. And I mean completely.
Piling up an improbable 26-4 edge in second-period shots on goal, they attacked in wave after wave, as if they’d been awarded a 20-minute power play. Or as Colby Armstrong commented later, “The Penguins forgot how to check.”
Jarry held the fort for a time, but he, too, eventually wilted. Evander Kane, who unleased a staggering eight shots on goal during the period (twice as many as our Pens if you’re keeping track), walked out of the corner and past Brian Dumoulin to beat Jarry short side at 15:09, in the process knotting the score at 3-all.
Then the dam burst. Ryan Nugent-Hopkins struck from the slot at 18:28, followed in rapid succession by Mannheim steamroller Leon Draisaitl with 23 seconds left in the period. (Actually he’s from Cologne.)
That was pretty much all she wrote. Sullivan juggled his lines, to no avail. With 3:15 to go Ryan McLeod drove the final nail into our collective coffin, scoring on yet another unfettered shot from the slot.
Puckpourri
The Oilers outshot the Pens, 47-35, and won 54 percent of the faceoffs. Five-on-five, they attempted 64 shots to our 40, had 27 scoring chances to our 13, including an astonishing 16-5 edge in high-danger chances according to Natural Stat Trick.
Our top tandem of Dumoulin and Letang was dreadful. Each was a minus-three.
On the positive side of the ledger, Rakell enjoyed a strong game. He finished with a goal and an assist and was one of three Pens to finish a plus-one. Jan Rutta and Pierre Olivier-Joseph were the others.
Zucker, who continues to impress with his hustle and aggressive play, registered two assists and four hits.
The Malkin line was our most effective trio (64.29 Corsi) until Sullivan broke it up, shifting Rust to Sid’s unit and Kasperi Kapanen to Geno’s flank, with negligible results.
Drake Caggiula played his first game with the black and gold. He was a minus-one in 7:28 of ice time.
Quote of the Night
Following Nugent-Hopkins’ goal, color analyst Bob Errey lamented, “Nobody’s eliminating anybody. Look at the bodies that are open. They (the Pens) are just following the puck.”
Houston We Have a Problem
Entering the season, I was concerned about how our Pens would fare in “normal” games. Would we be able to grind out playoff-style wins of the 2-1, 3-2 variety?
Six games in, I still don’t have an answer, mostly because we’ve yet to play what I’d call a normal game. Unless you count our lackluster 3-2 overtime loss to Montreal.
Indeed, our games have a decidedly bipolar feel. We’re either skating foes into the ice with manic intensity or having it done to us. Giving our games a decided track meet feel.
I’ll repeat my question. Can our Pens play solid, structured hockey?
Thus far, the answer would appear to be a resounding no.
On Tap
The Pens (4-1-1) travel to Calgary to take on the Flames (4-1), a team that dominated us last season. Then it’s off to Vancouver (Friday) and Seattle (Saturday) to complete the road trip.
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Hey Rick,
I want to start by saying our Penguins are 4-1-1, that is a pretty darn good start. Last night's hiccup is only 1 loss. There are 76 more games to go, just to get to the playoffs, then once there we have another 4 - 7 games if our Penguins continue their 1st round loss streak.maybe as many as if the team decides to change things up, try something new. So, I am not in panic mode.
Although I am not in panic mode, that doesn't mean I don't have concerns.
1) I like the vast majority of forwards on this team but they are old; that is the plain truth.
- You note that they have yet to put in a full 60 minutes, their M.O. has been slow starts before coming on strong for the most part. Last night they reversed that effort and started off strong only to wilt. Their M.O. may be tied in to their age. They may not be able to play the whole game hard. They may need to pace themselves early on so they have a kick at the end because they may not be able to go [euphemism] to the wall for 6 minutes anymore.
2) As I said, I do think our Penguins have a lot of quality forwards but I have to say this, their potent offense to date may be more of a factor of facing back-up goaltenders and even when not the back up, low-end Goaltending.
-Vejmelka of Az - Sv% 0.877. He ended the game against us with a 0.887 Sv%, his other Games were 0.881 (Bos), 0.929 (Tor), 0813 (Ott). Ott and Bos shot better than we did against him. He played better against us than his avg.
- Elliot of TBL - Back up. Sv% 0.899, 0.866 against us, 0.914 against NYI. 2 of the last 3 seasons his Sv% has been under 0.900%.
- Montembeault of Mtl - Back up. Sv% 0.912 and beat us. He ended the game against us with a Sv% of 0.929, against Was he only posted a 0.897%
- Petersen of LAK - Back up. Sv% 0.842 so far this season. Against us 0.667, 0.829 (Min), and 0.906 (Nsh). We really are the cause of his low Sv% but he is no great star this season, so all we did was what we should have done, chased him from the net.
- Quick of Lak - Starter but coming in for relief, Sv% 0.889 for the season, 0.880 against us, 0.922 (Veg), 0.857 (Sea), 0.879 (Det), and 0.875 (Was). Again not a very impressive resume so far for an opposing G.
- Merzlikins of CBJ. Sv% 0.864%, against us 0.846%, 0.800 (Stl), 0.914, and (Van), 0.885
- Campbell of Edm. Even Edm didn't trot out a strong G against us, Sv% 0.895% for the season; against us 0.914, 0.917 (Van), 0.636 (Cal), 0.900 (Car), 0.952 (Stl - only 21 SOG that game),
3) Defensively, I do think the RHD are pretty solid, but the LHD have many "?s" Dumoulin struggled last night and all of last season. POJ has decent numbers but loses battles in front of his own net. I am no fan of Pettersson but right now he is the best of the 3. However, as a team, including the Forwards, our Pens have the 5th highest Shot Attempts against in the league at 61.96/60 all strengths, 8th worst 5 on 5 (62.06/60).
4) Sullivan last night broke up the one line that was working so that no lines were working, Same Old Sully (SOS)
As I said, I am not in panic mode, but these are my concerns.
Hey Coach,
Very good analysis.
You say to date we are the 8th worse team in the league 5 on 5 statistically. That is great information to know. I wonder how we fared last year as a team 5 on 5 for the season? I never thought 5 on 5 play was a strength for the Pens in 2022. It always was the special teams that won us our games. Thanks for the information..Can this team of old men keep up the 8th ranking come March ?
That is the real question !
Cheers
JIM
Hey Jim,
Yep, as of when I wrote that, 8th worst team 5 on 5 in Shot attempts against per 60.
We do have to remember that it is early in the season and these numbers are very volatile but those numbers are very concerning for a team whose identity is supposed to be out skating your opponent and limiting chances against by tying the puck up in the attacking zone. And it isn't like all of those games we played so far were all against other high powered offenses, we didn't play those 6 games against Edmonton, we had Az, Mtl, and CBJ sprinkled in there.
I actually don't have that great of a problem with the idea of keeping the core in tact, provided that we had a solid cadre of young players to support our aging stars, but instead of surrounding our future HoFers with young, hungry lions, we surrounded them with more aging veterans, some who have put up some numbers in the past, the rest journeymen.
I never had the opportunity to go through and write my full season preview, I only looked at the Center position. If you remember I predicted that the team would lose about 40 -60 man games at that position. Even though he is the youngest of our core Center, Blueger is already on LTIR. What I didn't get time to post was my look at our LWs. I only talked about this with Rick B. I said something very similar, that our LWs would lose between 35 - 50 man games, Guentzel and Zucker are already piling those numbers up.
The rose-colored glass set came out in force when the critical thinkers were irate over losing Zohorna to the Waiver Wire, instead of risking the loss of a clone of a Defenseman. Maybe it will all work out for the rose colored glass set, it is still early, but, at least right now, it would seem that a LW like Zohorna could have benefited this team sans Jake and Jason. However, I doubt their arrogance would allow them to concede the possibility of an ice-berg looming dead ahead, and understand why the rest of us found the loss alarming. I would expect them to double down in their vitriol.