Plucky Penguins Fall Prey to Panthers in Shootout

For 20 minutes and change last night at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise, Florida, it looked as though our plucky Penguins were poised to pull off yet another upset against a playoff-bound club.

After falling behind the Panthers on a goal by Sam Reinhart midway through the opening period, the Pens proceeded to snatch the lead on a pair of tallies by Bryan Rust and a third by Evgeni Malkin at 6:51 of the second.

Up 3-1, we appeared to have the defending Cup champs (who’d played and lost the day before) sagging and on the ropes, awaiting the knockout punch.

Then Rust was whistled off for hooking and the sharpshooting Reinhart struck on the ensuing power play. From that point on, the game literally flipped on its end.

Following 25 minutes of us circling the wagons or playing Katy-bar-the-door hockey, take your pick, the Panthers knotted the score with just over 5 minutes left in regulation on a goal by a wide (and I mean W-I-D-E) open Anton Lundell.

From there, the Pens managed to weather the storm and force overtime. Neither club capitalized, and it was on to a shootout, where things generally don’t go too well for our boys (1-5 entering the game).

Make that 1-6. Aleksander Barkov beat Tristan Jarry right out of the chute, while our big three of Rickard Rakell, Sidney Crosby and Rust failed to solve Sergei Bobrovsky.

Puckpourri

The Pens outshot their hosts by a whopping 16-4 in the first period, only to be outgunned 26-11 the rest of the way.

Despite the disappointing outcome, absolutely no issues with our effort. For the most part we competed and battled hard. First line aside, we just don’t have the horses.

As much as we could use help up front, shoring up our defense needs to be a priority. While I hate to pick on a guy or scapegoat him, Ryan Graves was just awful yesterday. Reinhart blew past him like a rusty gate on the Panthers’ second goal. On the game-tying tally, Graves was positioned to the right of our net next to Erik Karlsson, presumably to double-cover the ever-dangerous Jesper Boqvist, while Lundell had a virtual zip code to himself on the opposite side of the ice.

To be kind, Graves looks perpetually ill-positioned and out-of-sync with the play in front of him. I see a BUYOUT CANDIDATE sign in neon, block letters hanging over his locker.

Sometimes, you just have to admit to the mistake and move on. (FYI: count me among those who thought he’d be a great addition for our Pens.)

On the flip side, Kris Letang appeared to have visited Ponce de León’s fountain of youth in St. Augustine prior to the contest. Tanger was a stud, logging a robust 26:40 of ice time, delivering three hits and blocking two shots while unleashing five of his own.

Karlsson registered his 40^th assist on Rust’s first goal to reach 50 points for the second season in a row. Matt Grzelcyk recorded his career-best 32^nd assist on Geno’s tally. In seven games since the trade deadline, Matt’s very quietly been a plus-9.

Back to our first line. Rust had a hand in all three goals (2+1). For the season, Rusty has 25 goals and 54 points, both approaching his career-highs of 28 and 58, respectively.

Sid had two helpers, upping his season points total to 78. He’s a virtual lock to record a record-setting 20^th consecutive season of point-per-game production. And Rakell added his 30^th assist, the third time he’s reached that mark.

With 27 saves on 30 shots, Jarry continued his resurgent play between the pipes. So much has been made of our goaltending issues, and there certainly have been times this season when it’s faltered and/or flat-out failed. But I, for one, point the finger more at our watery team defense. The great Georges Vezina would log an .875 save percentage backstopping this porous bunch.

Speaking of netminders, a shout-out to Baby Pens phenom Sergei Murashov, who set a new club rookie record with 10 wins in a row, snapping Matt Murray’s old mark.