It’s an annual tradition like no other. It’s not Christmas, Hanukah, or even Kwanza. Kris Letang will be missing a few weeks of action due to injury. He is week to week with a low body injury. As is always the case Kris Letang is one of the players the Penguins can least afford to lose. He is a machine in both the amount of time he plays as well as the quality of those minutes.
So Kris is out. Who’s going to replace him?
Here is what the Penguins have to attempt to replace
Kris Letang is okay at teh hockeys pic.twitter.com/ntTA226UvB
— Muneeb Alam (@muneebalamcu) December 15, 2016
Yeah, Kris Letang is very good.
While the team cannot replace Kris Letang they will need to have a few players step outside of their comfort zones in order to attempt this difficult task. Trevor Daley is going to get more minutes. He hasn’t had a great year so far. His possession has fallen back in line with his larger career sample after playing great for the team last year.
Justin Schultz has been awesome on the bottom pairing with Ian Cole. He has been so good that his points per 60 at both even-strength and all-situations has been better than Letang this year. What can he do in an elevated role? I think we are about to find out and that is a good thing considering his contract is up at the end of the year.
Josh Yohe of DK on Pittsburgh Sports was able to get some quotes from Jim Rutherford on Justin Schultz’s future with the team:
Locking up Schultz to a long-term deal is of interest to Rutherford.“I can say this,… Rutherford said before saying it publicly for the first time. “We want to do that. We want to keep him here for a long time.…
Schultz, 26, was acquired from the Oilers last season for a third-round pick. During the past eight games, Schultz has exploded for 12 points, but he also was playing quite well before then.
“I am very pleased with his play, obviously,… Rutherford said. “I haven’t gotten to the point of thinking about a contract just yet.…
GMs don’t always like negotiating deals during the regular season, but Rutherford might not be against it in this case.
“I’m not saying we wouldn’t do that. It’s something we will do with some players. There’s an upside and a downside to it. The obvious downside is that I’ve seen it take a focus away from a player, especially if negotiations don’t go great from the start. Right now, we’re just trying to win games. He’s still restricted for one more season, so it doesn’t have to be done immediately.…
If I were the Penguins, I would let more of the season play out.
Derrick Pouliot was called up from the Baby Penguins. Injury was the likeliest way he was going to get NHL time this year and the team now has an injured player that needs replacing. Despite all the criticisms levied towards Pouliot and his development I would be surprised if he gave the Penguins less than what Olli Maatta has given the team this year.
So what will the pairings look like? The team could really go down a few different paths. They could keep Cole and Schultz together and just give them more minutes or they could split that pairing. Here are a few options:
Dumoulin-Daley Cole-Schultz Maatta-Pouliot
Considering how well Cole and Schultz have played perhaps the most prudent move is to just give them a harder assignment. If the dCorsi metric were readily available, I would imagine that the Cole-Schultz pairing would be high on it indicating they were killing their assignment.
Dumoulin-Schultz Maatta-Daley Cole-Pouliot
Derrick Pouliot has played 110:34 with Ian Cole in his career and together they control 59.7% of the shot attempts when on the ice. This does leave the underwhelming Maatta-Daley pairing together, but it will give the team an opportunity to really see if Schultz can handle a tougher role for the first time since leaving Edmonton where he didn’t do so well. If the team wants to keep him long term it would be prudent to find out if he can handle more than a bottom pairing assignment.
Whatever the team does it will have their hands full tonight. The Los Angeles Kings are in the building and they remain one of the best possession teams in the NHL. They are second to only Boston and have a Score-Adjusted Fenwick of 54.1%.
The Kings are without Jonathan Quick and as a result they have resorted to a Peter Budaj and Jeff Zatkoff tandem. The Kings are ranked 22nd in the NHL in even-strength save percentage at .916. Jeff Zatkoff started last night and it remains to be seen if he will indeed make the start against his former team with whom he won a Stanley Cup.
Jonathan Quick is wildly overrated by some, but much like Fleury he is a slightly above average goalie with high variance.
Pittsburgh is one of the best teams in the league at generating shot-attempts and Los Angeles is one of the best teams in the league at preventing them. The loss of Kris Letang to the Penguins lineup is going to definitely favor the Kings in this matchup.
Pittsburgh will try to make it eight in a row tonight and remain undefeated in the month of December.
Thanks for reading!