The topic surrounding the Penguins continues to be injuries. Today the team should be getting Jake Guentzel and Ron Hainsey back into the lineup so that is good news. Mike Sullivan also said that the team expects Evgeni Malkin and Kris Letang to be back for the playoffs which is also good news. The Penguins will not repeat if these things don’t happen.
A few years ago the Penguins bottom six forward depth was significantly worse than their top six. This posed an issue if the top six players went through a scoring drought. It is impossible to avoid droughts and sometimes they happen at the worst time. When that happens you need support to overcome and advance.
Here’s a flashback to a graph Tyler Dellow published in 2013-14
We all know how the later years of the Bylsma era ended. He had incredibly top heavy teams and he had a strong bias to untalented grinders. When Sid and Geno went dry the team was cooked.
Don’t get me wrong the Penguins depth isn’t close to being as bad as it was during those years, but the 2016-17 Penguins are showing some signs of a top six and bottom six divide that didn’t exist heading into the playoffs last year. Evgeni Malkin and Carl Hagelin have missed extended time, but the data below is for the entire year. HBK has been a failure in 2016-17 when compared to last season.
Once again I will be using some Tyler Dellow content to show this point
This is a graph of differences between top 6 and bottom 6 Corsi%. Teams on the left are really top heavy. Teams on right are more balanced. pic.twitter.com/ZIqgAsL9C3
— dellowhockey (@dellowhockey) March 31, 2017
Here's the goal version of that. If you're way to the left, it probably means your depth guys aren't producing at all. pic.twitter.com/iv5frRrnFN
— dellowhockey (@dellowhockey) March 31, 2017
Four of the five teams with a top six above +10 are going to miss and I don't think Ottawa's going to be around for very long.
— dellowhockey (@dellowhockey) March 31, 2017
A huge reason the Penguins were successful last year was because their third line of Phil Kessel, Nick Bonino, and Carl Hagelin were excellent. This year the Penguins have not received that kind of production from their bottom six. This is a big deal considering that the defense corp. was not and is not a strength of the team. Last year the defense corp. was able to compliment the Penguins forwards and helped facilitate the Penguins deadly offensive attack. If the Penguins don’t have balanced scoring and quality possession from all forwards it will put stress on the defense corp. to defend. That isn’t going to be a successful recipe given how the team is currently built. Even with a completely healthy defense this team’s success will be driven by the forwards.
If the Penguins can pull off a miracle and ice a healthy roster they are going to need those healthy players to all be playing at a similar level to last year to navigate their way through the minefield that is the Eastern Conference. Right now there are cracks in the armor even with full health. It is something to pay attention to as the most important time of the year approaches.
Thanks for reading!