With an opportunity to build off of their excellent win on Thursday the Penguins had the Ottawa Senators on a three-game losing streak. The Penguins skaters put together a respectable performance. Their goaltender, did not.
Pittsburgh out-attempted Ottawa 70-39 at 5v5 and had a 63.51 xGF%. While I think the Penguins skaters need to be able to turn a performance like this into more tangible offense, I also think Tristan Jarry being wildly outplayed by Joonas Korpisalo like last night is insurmountable most nights. Jarry only stopped six out of the nine shots he faced while his team was vastly outplaying the Senators. With Alex Nedeljkovic out for weeks the Penguins don’t have any kind of safety net behind Jarry and it is arguable if they do or not with Nedeljkovic. This means Jarry needs to step up and provide average goaltending or better. He was complete rubbish last night. People can get frustrated the Penguins aren’t finishing their chances. It is a valid criticism. However, there’s always a goalie on the other side stopping those shots and it happens quite often. Why can’t the Penguins 5.375M goalie do the same thing. These are the kinds of starts on why most people heavily questioned the contract extension. Right now the Penguins are in last place in the Metropolitan Division. They can’t afford to have their freshly signed goalie having these types of outings.
The Penguins only have two goals from their bottom six. The fourth line hasn’t done a thing yet this year and combine for 5.925M. The Jeff Carter charity case has to end. He’s completely shot. The things he could do well just don’t happen anymore. He isn’t even making plays the few times he does have time and space. If he was a 25-year-old 7th round pick his butt would already be back to WB/S and likely not given another look for promotion again. Time to treat the situation like that. You’re in last place. Stop gifting jerseys out, just because.
The power play fix, for now, isn't complicated. Get Sidney Crosby and Jake Guentzel’s rear ends in front of the net and just let Erik Karlsson and Evgeni Malkin rip shots. A shoot first and often power play has its flaws for sure, but the Penguins don't deserve another approach at the moment. You have a power play unit who is struggling and one that is also not getting a lot of opportunities to make it right. After getting only two opportunities last night the Penguins are dead last in the NHL in power play opportunities per game at 2.5. They are only one of two teams under three. It has been a real rough start all around for the power play.
Up next they have the Anaheim Ducks on Monday and then they are off until Saturday when they embark on their west coast road trip against Anaheim again, San Jose, and Los Angeles. They have no excuses to not take three out of four of those games. It has to happen. It’s the hole they’ve dug for themselves by losing to team like Chicago, St. Louis, and Ottawa. Teams out of the playoff picture during American Thanksgiving are statistically very unlikely to make the playoffs. This team needs to get it in gear this month or the season will be over before it really began.
Thanks for reading!