The Penguins road trip was a complete disaster. After starting things off on a good note with their victory over Columbus things unraveled. The team lost four straight games with much of the trip looking flat and unable to score.
The trip highlighted the team’s thin depth and also how they are relying on some players who just can’t handle their current assignments. A few injuries to the top six and things get dicey. The team should have Jake Guentzel, Jason Zucker, and eventually Teddy Blueger(practiced in normal jersey), which should help things. Jeff Carter didn’t return to the game on Satuday so there might be a hole to fill there. Regardless, the team still need to shake things up and it looks like they are about to do so.
The Penguins have recalled forward Drew O’Connor from the @WBSPenguins.
— Pittsburgh Penguins (@penguins) October 31, 2022
Forward Drake Caggiula has been re-assigned to the WBS Penguins. https://t.co/g1FdvqwQAz
This isn’t a huge move, but anytime you can add a player to the lineup who is better than the one you are replacing it is something you should do. Drew O’Connor should have been with the big club from the beginning on merit. The only reason he was sent down was because of his waiver status, which allowed the Penguins to send him down without the threat of being claimed. This was in order to become cap compliant.
If the team can have O’Connor eat up some minutes while getting Teddy Blueger to return it paves the path to sit down Josh Archibald who has taken way too many penalties given his role on the team. He isn’t going to make up for it with offense or defense. He’s just a bit player. The penalties have been too much.
A hypothetical forward lineup could be as follows:
Guentzel-Crosby-Rakell Zucker-Malkin-Rust Heinen-Carter-Kapanen O’Connor-Blueger-McGinn
Still not a great bottom six. I like it more than if it had Josh Archibald or Drake Caggiula in it.
As for the defense the biggest and most obvious change is to take Brian Dumoulin off the top pairing. I can’t in good faith begin to evaluate Kris Letang’s play when he is carrying around a below-replacement level player in top pairing minutes. What is the realistic expectation here? You can’t reasonably expect Letang to be able to be at his best when he’s playing tough minutes with an incapable partner. Dumoulin needs bottom pairing minutes or no minutes at all until further notice. A lot of Letang’s mistakes, and there have been mistakes, are likely due to overcompensating for his partner.
Ty Smith was another waiver casualty to start the season. He played good enough to stay with the big club. It remains to be seen how soon they want to reacclimate him to the NHL. As of right now Pierre-Olivier Joseph is the guy up and they should temporarily give him more minutes while they decrease Dumoulin’s. For now, I might go with the following setup:
Pettersson-Letang POJ-Petry Dumoulin-Rutta
I think it is asking a lot to have Olivier-Joseph play top pairing minutes. Let Pettersson give it a try. He is the most dependable of the left side defenders at the moment. I have Dumoulin on the bottom pair, but I can be very easily swayed to have him on the outside looking in to put Ruhwedel in the lineup.
The team doesn’t have much time to collect themselves. They get the Boston Bruins tomorrow who recently welcomed back Brad Marchand. The Bruins are currently 8-1-0 and have a 57.01 xGF%, good for 5th in the league. The Penguins will not be easing themselves back into things. This is a very tough matchup.
Before the road trip the Penguins were 3-0-1 and tied for first place. After the five games they are 4-4-1 and in seventh out of eight teams in the Metropolitan. They took scissors to their safety net. Things have the potential to go off the rails if they don’t stop the bleeding soon. Things get really tough if you are out of a playoff spot by the time American Thanksgiving hits. The Penguins aren’t in trouble yet, but they have to start collecting some points and absolutely cannot have another stretch like they’ve just had.
Thanks for reading!