The Pittsburgh Penguins will close out 2016 with a New Year’s Eve matchup against the Montreal Canadiens. This will be the team’s last game before their CBA mandated bye week. They will play again on January 8th against Tampa Bay
There were some roster changes the past few days.
The first was related to injury. Matt Murray is going to be week to week and as a result the Penguins recalled Tristan Jarry. The last time Murray was injured Marc-Andre Fleury started every single game. Jarry has been playing great in the AHL with an all situations save percentage of .921. The Penguins have a back to back on January 11th and 12th, but because of the bye week it is plausible that Fleury starts both of them anyways.
The other roster move was sending Derrick Pouliot back to the Baby Penguins. This last callup was his worst stretch in the NHL. He did not play well and as a result he may have played his last game with the team. Pouliot’s early samples in the NHL were positive and he wasn’t able to regain that level of play recently. Who knows how things would have turned out if the Penguins stuck with him when he was playing well instead of sending him to WB/S but I would wager it would have been better than what they got. Tough to say what kind of trade value the former 8th overall pick will have, but it isn’t going to be good. The team mismanaged this asset. If they didn’t like him they should have been proactive and moved him.
Illness has stricken some of the Penguins in recent days.
Olli Maatta said he was in bed for five days ill. Bryan Rust missed today, sick. Apparently it's wash-your-hands-a-lot time.
— Jason Mackey (@JMackeyPG) December 30, 2016
Kris Letang was working with the #1 power play unit so it might not be out of the question to see him tonight play against the Montreal Canadiens. The Penguins did a pretty nice job navigating their time without Letang.
2016 was a good year for the Penguins. They will look to make it four in a row.
Thanks for reading!