With our floundering Penguins mercifully entering their bye week, I got the idea to compare them to a couple of our Metro rivals. Kind of a what do they got that we ain’t got sort of thing.
I’ll start with the division-leading Hurricanes. As we all know, the ‘Canes are just a royal pain in the posterior to play against. This season we logged an 0-2-2 record against them. Going back through the 2019-20 season, we’re 1-4-3 against our Raleigh-based rivals. You have to go back to ’18-19, Rod Brind’Amour’s first season at the helm, for the Pens to wind up on the winning side of the ledger (2-1-1).
And it isn’t just us. With a record of 32-9-8 and 72 points, they’re beating everybody. Sunday night the ‘Canes ground the previously unstoppable Bruins to dust en route to a relatively easy 4-1 victory.
It begs the question. Are the ‘Canes that good? Or more to the point, are they that much better than us?
Glancing at their stats on Hockey Reference, the answer would appear to be no. Martin Necas, Sebastien Aho and Andrei Svechnikov are talented players to be sure, but no more than our top guns Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and Jake Guentzel.
Their fifth and sixth leading scorers? Jordan Martinook and ex-Pen Stefan Noesen, a 29-year-old journeyman forward who’s spent most of his career bouncing between the NHL and the AHL.
Must be the goaltending, right? Well…yes and no. The triumvirate of Frederik Andersen, Antti Raanta and rookie Pyotr Kochetkov have combined for a .907 save percentage. Our goalies have a .912 save percentage…Vezina-esque by comparison. Despite recent woes, our backup Casey DeSmith sits at .901 compared to Raanta’s .897.
Ah, then it’s roster construction and depth scoring. Uh uh. Think we have underachievers with the likes of Kasperi Kapanen and Teddy Blueger? Jesperi Kotkaniemi, pirated away from the Canadiens and expected to be a star, has seven goals in 49 games at a cap hit of $4.82 million. With just four goals in 39 games, three-time 20-goal scorer Teuvo Teravainen has totally tanked this season. He pulls down $5.4 million.
Compared to these guys, Kappy looks like a steal at $3.2 million.
Well, I guess it’s age. After all, the Pens are the oldest team in the league with an average age of 29.9 years. Nope. Although the ‘Canes are relative spring chickens at 27.4 (17th oldest), they have 10 players over the age of 30, including Andersen, Raanta and fellow graybeards Brent Burns (37), Paul Stastny (36), Jordan Staal and injury-prone Max Pacioretty (33 each).
About their only clear-cut edge? The ‘Canes have an offensive defense. Despite the presence of Kris Letang and Jeff Petry, we don’t.
Okay, I give up. Why are they so much better than us?
Two things. The ‘Canes play a fast, physical style, aggressive but at the same time controlled and disciplined. And…here’s the key…they don’t beat themselves.
They’re very much a reflection of Brind’Amour, a grinding two-way center who played in 1484 NHL games and was renowned for his impeccable work ethic and attention to detail, not to mention sterling defensive play.
None of the above adjectives could be used to describe our Pens. In fact, in many ways we’re the anti- ‘Canes. The sloppiness, the fast-and-loose play, the utter lack of structure…especially in the d-zone. Every game of late has been a Keystone Kops comedy of errors.
We’ve become masters of shooting ourselves in the foot.
This isn’t intended to be a character assassination of Mike Sullivan, regarded by most to be a very good coach. The players are certainly culpable to a large degree. They’re the ones out on the ice executing…or as far more often is the case of late…not executing.
However, in stark contrast to Sully’s Carolina counterpart, it’s painfully clear that whatever message he’s preaching isn’t getting through. He alluded to as much during his postgame comments following the dreadful loss to San Jose on Saturday night.
“It starts with me,” he said. “I’ve got to do a better job of coaching these guys and getting it out of them and making sure that the message is being heard. We’ve got to learn through the experiences.”
Sullivan also needs to do a better job with the personnel on hand. Why do players like Noesen (pictured above) and undrafted defenseman Jalen Chatfield thrive under Brind’Amour?
He gives them a chance.
Contrast that with Pens forward Drew O’Connor, who’s been limited to an eye-dropperish 8:41 of ice time per game despite strong underlying metrics. Or any number of young players who’ve churned through the Pens’ pipeline over the past few years after being given the Sully treatment.
To sum up, the ‘Canes aren’t better than the Pens because they’re younger or more gifted or get airtight goaltending. Plain and simple, their coach has gotten them to buy into and execute a system that maximizes their talents and abilities.
Ours hasn’t. Indeed, more often than not, we resemble a fire drill. A shotgun blast of a hockey team…every player scrambling in their own wayward direction.
It’s up to Sullivan and his staff to rein our guys in and get them on the same page, playing as a unit and with a common purpose.
Our playoff lives depend on it.
Hey Rick,
The simple truth is yes they are. They are faster, bigger ,younger,grittier and everyone knows their role on the Cannes team.
They play a different style against different teams trying to find the advantage to win the game.
We play the same way every night. Trying to out skate the opposition when we are no longer a fast team. Plus they have a farm system where by they actually develop players.
Finally they attack Crosby and they let the other 3 lines look after themselves and they try NOT to take penalties.
That is my rant..
BTW, did you see that the Islanders signed Canucks Captain Bo Horvat . Reports say they are not finished and they plan to add more players. That is not good for us….
Cheers
Jim
Jim
I agree with you and in my humble opinion the only way to salvage this season and beyond is for Hextall
to make the tough decisions and begin to restructure the current roster for success in the playoffs.
To be totally honest I’m not sure Hextall has the backbone to make the necessary moves.
Well said Mike. 100 % agree. Hextall is not the man to do this and he is well aware of just how far he can go and still KEEP his job. Just look what happened to his predecessor.
Cheers
Jim
Hey Rick, Jim, Mike,
You said a mouthful Jim, the stats that really matter when comparing these 2 teams are Age, Height, and Weight and the Canes destroy the Pens in all three categories. And I am not just guessing when I make this statement. When Rick mentioned to me he was going to write this article, I was thinking along Jim’s lines, it seemed obvious but I wanted to make sure. So I went back through and multiplied age, hgt, and wgt against TOI to get the avg of these 3 numbers per minute of 5on5 hockey each player played and the players Sully has trotted out against opponents is on avg older and smaller than those Brind’Amour employs:
Penguins
Avg Age: 30.23, Avg Hgt: 73.10, Avg Wgt: 194.04
Hurricanes
Avg Age: 28.2, Avg Hgt: 73.58, Avg Wgt: 199.07
So the Canes are 2.03 years younger than our Pens, just about 1/2″ (0.48″) taller, and 5.03 lbs heavier. I for 1 am not shocked that a younger team with reach and mass is that far about our aging smurfs.
You Rick may not want to levy any charges against Sully but I will. I won’t exonerate GMRH either. Both of these paleontologists are the architects of this team of tiny dinosaur herbivores.
Hey Coach, thanks for the backup. Great job in doing the research to prove our point.
I am not anti Penguin here by any means,I am just trying to give everyone a reality check.
This Bo Hovart signing by the Islanders is huge because it illustrates with out Cap space and
players that other teams want to trade for, the GM job is futile. We simply could not do that trade !
Cheers
JIM
Hello Jim,
Just read about the Horvat trade. A shocker, at least in my eyes. It gives the Islanders another big forward and a very capable goal scorer. They were really having trouble of late finding the net.
Frankly, I’m surprised Horvat went as cheaply as he did. While I’ve always liked Anthony Beauvillier, I never thought he produced to match his skill level. Aatu Raty put up strong numbers his last season in the SM-liiga, but you never know that translates to North America. And, of course, a first-round pick, which is nice but no guarantee you’ll get a quality player.
It sure puts more heat on us to get our act together…and for Hextall to make a move. Problem is, there isn’t any one thing that’s going to fix us. Perhaps the biggest impediment to me is Carter. Faceoff circle aside, he’s dead weight. Blueger’s game has really gone south as well. Don’t know if he’s fixable or if he’d bring anything in a trade.
They need a physical spark from somewhere. A huge challenge as long as Sullivan’s coach. (Ruhwedel over Friedman every time.) If he ever gets healthy, Archibald should provide some, but they need more than that.
Internally, I’d like to see what Valtteri Puustinen could do. But again, you have the Sully kid blockade factor.
A legit backup goalie is a need, too, although I don’t blame everything on DeSmith. The Pens’ defensive play, if you can call it that, has been deplorable.
Anyway…none of this bodes well.
Rick
Hi Rick,
The islanders stole Bo Hovart. JR is losing his touch. The Rangers are about to make a major trade addition and so are the Devils. Florida, Buffalo,Toronto,Boston are all planning to get better by the trade deadline as well. We are going to be lucky to make the 2nd Wild card berth.
I forgot about the big kid Valtteri Puustinen. Agree, he should be given every opportunity to be a regular member of the Pens team but as you correctly point out, our Coach is the problem. Just thinking about this drives me crazy.
It would not matter if we won the 2023 NHL Draft lottery and we drafted Conner Bedard because Sullivan would only play him 6 minutes a game and on the 4 th line anyway. He would never see the power play.
This team has many issues Rick and I am afraid we know all to well we will never win A CUP THIS YEAR OR NEXT as long as everything remains the same.. They need major changes.
Then the real question becomes what does Crosby do ?? Does he play his final year or does he request a trade to a Cup contender ?
Cheers
JIM
Hey Jim,
The father of a kid for whom I do the off season strength and conditioning (plays in the NAHL), often is around our Penguins players in off ice situations. I usually take what he says with a grain of salt when it comes to the Penguins though, he is a trader, Caps fan (not sure why), but he told me he overheard a conversation between Crosby and Carter back at the end of November where Carter said he was already so beat up that he didn’t know how he was going to last until April. Watching how Carter has disappeared, I lend more credence to that story.
give ,more not lend more credence