The team has had a few days to soak in their impressive 4-0 victory over the Nashville Predators. Tonight the Penguins will get back to work against another team they eliminated from the 2017 playoffs, the Washington Capitals.
Washington was a great team last year. They should have been able to win it all. They should have at least make the Eastern Conference Finals. They squandered that chance when they no showed Game 7 against the Penguins. The Capitals are still a good team. They just aren't the juggernaut they were last year and I can't see a situation in the near future where they will be able to collect that amount of talent on the roster again.
Tonight will be the first game against an Eastern Conference opponent for the Penguins this year. They are 1-1-1 against the Central Division (STL, CHI, NSH).
Writing the following emits such a 2008 vibe: Alex Ovechkin has seven goals in three games. He is almost up to 25% of his total goals from 2016-17. He is on fire. Should make for a fun game against Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin.
Pittsburgh won't get Ian Cole back tonight, but it sure looks likely that Patric Hornqvist will be making his 2017-18 debut. He is entering a pivotal year in his career as he is set to become a UFA at the end of the year. If I were the Penguins I wouldn't be rushing into any extension. I would let this season play out and see if there are any setbacks from a statistical and health standpoint. It is also worth tracking how he does if he is not with Sidney Crosby or Evgeni Malkin. His numbers weren't good with Bonino, but Bonino wasn't good last year. A larger sample is merited. Tonight he will be with Conor Sheary and Greg McKegg
#Pens lines:
— Pens Inside Scoop (@PensInsideScoop) October 11, 2017
Guentzel-Crosby-Rust
Hagelin-Malkin-Kessel
Sheary-McKegg-Hornqvist
Kuhnhackl-Rowney-Reaves
-SK
Carl Hagelin will remain with Evgeni Malkin and Phil Kessel. He needs to produce at even-strength with that kind of quality of teammate. If he gets off to a slow start I would not be surprised at all if the team tried to move his contract in order to create cap space for other trades.
Defensively here is what the team will be going with
#Pens D-pairs:
— Pens Inside Scoop (@PensInsideScoop) October 11, 2017
Dumoulin-Letang-(Summers)
Maatta-Ruhwedel
Hunwick-Schultz
-SK
Apparently they will be splitting Olli Maatta from Justin Schultz. I fail to see the logic here. If Olli Maatta is going to be an impact player for the team they need to load up the top two defense pairings and shelter their third pairing until Cole returns. Justin Schultz and Olli Maatta only played 66 minutes together last year. It was a year that saw Maatta struggle to find consistency. When Maatta was with Schultz he had a xGF% of 63.14 . That's great. I would try and continue to build off of that. The Chicago game is going to wreak havoc on the Penguins 2017-18 stats for the foreseeable future. That's how bad the game was and how small the current sample is. Long story short I'm not a fan of breaking up the Maatta-Schultz pairing.
Tonight will be a first for the Pittsburgh Penguins. They will be going up against a player that hails from Australia. Nathan Walker is the first Australian to play in the NHL. He scored his first career goal against Montreal earlier in the week. Congrats on an incredibly unique journey.
The Capitals are going to want this game badly. Nothing that happens tonight will give them back the best opportunity the Capitals had in the Ovechkin era. That is forever blown.
Thanks for reading!