Penguins Get Their Phil Of Goals In Very Entertaining Preseason Game (Penguins)

Penguins

Penguins Get Their Phil Of Goals In Very Entertaining Preseason Game

By Ryan Wilson

Sep 23, 2015 • 11:04 am

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No injuries. Check

Lots of goals. Check

None choppy online stream? Well, we can’t have it all.

Did I mention no injuries?

Last night was about as fun as preseason games get. Pittsburgh played a lot of their high end players and they all did high end things.

Let’s discuss some of it.

Kris Letang opened the scoring for the Penguins on a beautiful feed by Evgeni Malkin from the half wall. Not long after that Evgeni Malkin found the trailing Olli Maatta who wired home a beautiful slapshot for the goal. Mike Johnston talked specifically about his defensemen joining the offense more often this year and Evgeni Malkin’s excellent passing and vision is a big reason why that is a terrific idea. Here are the two goals

There are so many storylines from last night’s game and I think this comment is indicative of that.

Sidney Crosby and Phil Kessel just might be a successful duo. Shocker, right?

Phil Kessel scored twice in his Pittsburgh debut while Sidney Crosby racked up a goal and two assists. Zone entries are going to be plentiful this year because of the speed and skill that Crosby and Kessel have. Multiple times last night those two had Carolina defenders backing up which gave the two star players time and space to do good things. Here are Phil’s two goals.

I was watching TSN last night and the panel was talking about how Phil Kessel isn’t known for driving the net hard to score his goals. My immediate reaction was that he has never had a center who is able to draw attention away from him in order for that to be a successful strategy. Sidney Crosby is a player nobody is going to leave alone. Tyler Bozak is a player teams would rather take a chance on.

Chris Kunitz looked just fine on the left wing with both Sidney Crosby and Phil Kessel. He was good for two points and did not look out of place. In fact the coach thinks he is one of the front runners for that position.

Sergei Plotnikov was fine in his debut but I still believe Kunitz and Perron will be the two guys who will win the two top six left wing jobs.

Sidney Crosby’s backhand is butter

Daniel Sprong had a great game playing up with the big club. His skill is evident every time he touches the puck and he was able to keep up with the pace of play. Here he is on the power play taking time and space while finishing.

Coach Mike Johnston said the following about Sprong

I would give Sprong a ton of ice time during this training camp to give him a taste of quality competition before he is relegated back to the junior ranks. He belongs in the AHL, but that isn’t an option. I do not believe he will make the NHL squad, but from what we have seen it appears that he is definitely tracking to become a skilled top six winger at the top level which is great news.

Lastly, we have Sergei Gonchar. Let’s start with the good. He gave us all the nostalgic feelings we were looking for when he blasted home this power play goal.

Unfortunately that was the extent of his contributions. Gonchar was not very good at the even-strength part of the game last night.

Some people have suggested the Penguins keep Gonchar on the roster as a power play specialist but I am not a fan of keeping specialists of any kind around. If you can’t play at even-strength then I do not believe you deserve a roster spot on a contending team. The fact is the Penguins don’t need a power play specialist as they have more than enough talent on the roster. Furthermore, if you look at all of the recent Stanley Cup Champions you will notice that their success wasn’t driven by having a top power play anyways. It was driven by having great even-strength play

As you can see not a single champion is even in the top half of the league on their power play. No need to waste a roster spot on a power play specialist. Pittsburgh can easily take their chances with Kris Letang, Olli Maatta, and Derrick Pouliot running the power play.

I would continue to give Sergei Gonchar more ice time in the preseason in order to see if last night was a fluke, but chances are it wasn’t. Nostalgia is great but if he can’t play at even-strength there is no point in giving him a spot on the roster.

Thanks for reading!

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