Red Wings, Perron, Pummel Penguins, 7-4

Last March 27, nearly a year ago to the day, the Penguins lit up Detroit goalie Alex Nedeljkovic for seven goals en route to an 11-2 massacre of the Red Wings on home ice. For good measure, we destroyed the Red Wings, 7-2, in a return match at Little Caesars Arena on April 23.

What a difference a season makes. Indeed, you could say the speedy, determined Wings have redressed the balance, rallying from four goals down to beat us in OT on December 28 and pummeling us last night by a 7-4 count. In the process scoring eight unanswered goals against us.

How the mighty have fallen.

It was one of those games where every sin of a deeply flawed black-and-gold team reared its ugly head. A somnambulant start, exacerbated by two Mark Friedman penalties that put a sluggish group even further back on its collective heels. Atrocious d-zone coverage and penalty killing, fueled by a near-total lack of attention to detail cumulated into an all-too-familiar toxic stew. (I swear this team has ADHD.) The requisite penalty at precisely the wrong time. And porous goaltending, especially at crunch time.

Taking full advantage of our tepid start, not to mention Friedman’s offenses, the Red Wings coasted to a 3-0 first-period lead. I won’t go into the gory details except to say the first two goals by Jonatan Berggren and Andrew Copp came mid-period and only 34 seconds apart. Copp’s marker and Dominik Kubalik’s tally at 16:07 were aided by heavy traffic in front of Casey DeSmith.

Can you say, “Hit ‘em with your purse, Stackhouse?” (Old-timers will get the reference.)

Then, as they are wont to do, our guys magically found their legs in the second period. Jason Zucker, God bless his soul, struck from the slot at 4:40 following heavy pressure by our second line.

Aided by a 5-on-3 advantage, we did a little rapid-fire scoring of our own. At 7:46, Evgeni Malkin ripped a shot from the high slot that went in off Jake Guentzel, who was parked on the doorstep. Fifty-five ticks later we cashed in on a disputed goal by Jeff Carter, with a little help from Zucker, who nudged Nedeljkovic’s left pad (and the puck underneath) over the goal line.

Red Wings coach Derek Lalonde issued a challenge for goaltender interference…then went berserk when the goal stood…earning himself a rare game misconduct. However, the Pens failed to capitalize on the ensuing power play.

As is so often the case, an old “friend” came back to haunt us. Four minutes into the third period, Wings captain Dylan Larkin found David Perron wide open in the left circle. The ex-Pen whipped the puck past DeSmith to make it 4-3.

Just under a minute later, Josh Archibald countered for the black-and-gold on a wraparound to knot the game at 4-all.

And there the score stood until 3:48 remained, when Bryan Rust took what has become the now obligatory late-game penalty to open the door for our foes. Rusty’s high stick wasn’t intentional, a sin of commission rather than omission, but still…

…it took all of eight seconds for Perron to strike for the go-ahead (and game-winning) goal, again unfettered from the left side, this time through DeSmith’s exposed five-hole.

Forty-five seconds later Perron completed his one-man demo job, slipping through our lax defensive coverage like a knife through hot butter before lofting a backhander over DeSmith’s right arm.

A deserving Larkin pounded home the final nail with an empty-netter at 19:23 to complete the late-breaking blowout.

Puckpourri

As always, our Pens controlled the process but little else. According to Natural Stat Trick, we held the advantage in shot attempts (70-59), shots on goal (39-25), scoring chances (39-28) and high-danger chances (20-12).

Following a string of solid-to-very-good outings DeSmith…to be charitable…had a rough night, yielding six goals on 25 shots. For the record, the Wings aren’t exactly an offensive juggernaut (25^th in goals).

As for Perron? He’d scored only two goals in his previous 29 games.

Is any team victimized more by its former players than the Pens?

Does anyone else cringe at the sight of Pierre-Olivier Joseph doing just about anything in the defensive zone? And we thought Mike Matheson was an adventure in his own end! He’s got nothing on POJ.

Jeff Petry returned to the lineup, but was hardly airtight. Although he somehow finished the game with an even slate, he was on the ice (and out of position) on at least two goals against. Seems we were better off with no-frills veteran Taylor Fedun, who was returned to the Baby Pens following four solid games.

The Mikael Granlund-to-the-second-line experiment lasted one miserable period. Mike Sullivan returned “Granny” to the third line and elevated Rickard Rakell, who collected two assists.

Speaking of erstwhile third-liners, Kasperi Kapanen now has seven goals and 11 points in 15 games with the Blues.

Puckpourri

Nashville (37-28-8, 82 points) comes a callin’ on Thursday night. Stripped down at the trade deadline, the undermanned Preds are incredibly making a playoff push under coach John Hynes. The Pens (36-28-10, 82 points) had better get their heads out of their collective keisters.

Despite our near-continual bumbling, we’re still ensconced in the second Eastern wild-card spot, three points up on the Panthers.

For the zillionth time this season, one of the Pens (Zucker) remarked, “We’ve got to play better.”

If we miss the playoffs, that’ll be our epitaph.