The underachieving New York Islanders defeated the Pittsburgh Penguins by a score of 5-3 on Wednesday night. Pittsburgh didn’t play particularly bad at even-strength but you would hope to see a better result against one of the bottom teams in the league.
The biggest issue in the game on the Penguins side of things was that they took way too many penalties and it took away from time they could be on the attack. Pittsburgh proved during their three goal comeback that they were more than capable of generating offense against the Islanders. At 5v5 it was a back and forth affair and with Pittsburgh’s fire power more times than not they will come out on top.
One of the hardest things about covering Sidney Crosby is trying to come up with new ways to praise him. What else is there to be said that hasn’t bee said before? His forechecking on the Penguins first was remarkable. He made Travis Hamonic look like a d leaguer as he muscled him away from the puck and started the goal sequence.
Sid makes the most of a neutral zone turnover and earns a hard fought zone entry which facilitates a beautiful back and forth passing play between Brian Dumoulin and Evgeni Malkin.
Crosby didn’t score but he had two assists. The scary part about Crosby’s hot start this year is that he doesn’t have a lot of assists yet. That is part of his game that is always going to be there and I fully expect the assists to start to rack up.
There was a strange decision by Mike Sullivan in the third period. He benched Jake Guentzel in favor of Matt Cullen on the Malkin line. I’m not down with that choice. There was nothing about the way Guentzel was playing that merited him losing his spot on that line.
A great decision by Mike Sullivan was when he paired Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin together for a shift which resulted in the third goal. This duo should be on the ice together at even-strength more often than they are. I’m not calling for them to be put on the same line but there are game situations which would easily allow the coach to put the two headed monster together. One of those situations is after a penalty kill. Neither Sid or Geno kills penalties so they could come on fresh and more than likely get a favorable matchup after the power play players are tired. Another one is at the end of periods. There is no reason the lines can’t be shaken up in the final two or three minutes of a period. I would also look to take advantage of TV timeouts and use those as an opportunity to use some different combos.
Patric Hornqvist wasted no time getting into the mix in his return from a concussion. He was fiery and was the source of a few altercations. He ended the game with an assist.
Matt Murray didn’t have the best outing, but it did have some bright moments. Murray was spectacular during the full two minute 3v5 penalty kill and robbed Tavares blind, but it was nullified by the other goals against. He gave up four goals on only 29 shots and that doesn’t speak to the multiple posts the Islanders hit.
Pittsburgh will face the Dallas Stars tonight and they are a popular team for people to link Marc-Andre Fleury to. I don’t like this as a fit. Dallas would need to unload one of their pricey goaltenders in order to make room for Fleury and Pittsburgh taking back one of those goalies is a non-starter. Unless Dallas unloads Niemi or Lehtonen to another team I don’t know how something gets done with Dallas unless considerable salary is retained by the Stars.
Last year when the Penguins were struggling under Mike Johnston I wrote a lot about how I thought the Penguins should open up their style of play and trade shot attempts like the Dallas Stars. I looked at Dallas as a stylistic model for Pittsburgh given their struggles. Fast forward to this year and that Dallas Stars team does not exist. They aren’t playing that way so far this year and are significantly worse at generating shot attempts.
Another reason Dallas is having trouble winning this year versus last year is that their top two forwards have had a rough start to the year. Last year Tyler Seguin had a 5v5 points per 60 of 2.08 and Benn was at 2.19. This year Seguin is at 1.77 and Benn is at 1.43. Those are big drops from players that they lean on quite a bit. Jason Spezza going from 2.10 to 1.20 is also a huge problem.
At times it may feel like the Penguins aren’t on point on any given night but the fact is that their overall play this year has been good and entertaining.
Thanks for reading!
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