It seems like these recaps for the Pittsburgh Penguins are starting to get a bit redundant. And well, that’s probably because they are.
Because, for the seventh straight game, we’re talking about a Penguins’ loss.
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After a messy losing effort against the Edmonton Oilers at home on Tuesday, the Penguins embarked on the first leg of their annual Dads Trip on Thursday to face the Ottawa Senators in hopes of snapping their six-game losing streak. But from the moment they took the ice, they looked like a team that wasn’t ready to play.
The Penguins fell to Linus Ullmark and the Senators, 4-0, in one of their most listless efforts of the season to date. Ullmark stopped all 24 of the shots he faced, and Penguins’ goaltender Arturs Silovs stopped 22 of 25 Senators’ shots on goal.
This was one of those games where it felt like the Penguins were never really in it. However, they certainly didn’t get any help from the officiating from the jump, either.
Early in the game, Arturs Silovs was called for a tripping penalty on a net-front opportunity from the Senators – a questionable call, as there’s not much Silovs could have done there – and the Sens capitalized on the ensuing power play when Brady Tkachuk buried one a little more than two minutes into the game. The Penguins started to get a tiny fraction of momentum at the end of the first that they hoped to carry into the second.
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And, well, they did have a nice first shift by the first line of Rickard Rakell, Sidney Crosby, and Bryan Rust, and they were beginning to push a little bit. But a fortuitous bounce for Ottawa landed right by the net-front and next to David Perron, who put it past Silovs for his 800th career NHL point to make it 2-0 less than two minutes into the middle frame. Claude Giroux added another tally just three minutes later.
Then, in the third, the Penguins did start pushing a bit, and it resulted in a puck getting past Ullmark on a floater from Kris Letang at the point. However, the goal was waved off immediately on the ice, as the officials deemed that Rickard Rakell interefered with Ullmark.
The Penguins challenged, and – well – it seemed like a good challenge. Rakell was being hauled down by Jake Sanderson at the net front and outside of the blue paint, and Sanderson’s stick is the one that made contact with Ullmark. And the contact seemed to be initiated after the puck had already gotten behind Ullmark.
However, the Penguins lost the challenge, the call on the ice stood, and they weren’t able to recover. With around six minutes remaining in regulation, Silovs started skating to the Penguins’ bench for the extra attacker while Ottawa was breaking out of the defensive zone. With no goaltender in the net – and Silovs desperately trying to get back to the net – Tkachuk buried his second of the game, and the Penguins went down with a whimper.
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Things didn’t exactly go the Penguins’ way Thursday. But they still couldn’t find a way to respond to the adversity they faced, which is something they were doing at the beginning of the season.
Here are some takeaways from this one:
– This is as uninspired a performance I’ve seen from the Penguins this season. And it was like that from the drop of the puck.
Lately, the Penguins have gotten off to good starts in games. That wasn’t the case Thursday. Ottawa was pressuring hard from the start of the first period, and they never really relented until a spell in the third period prior to the disallowed goal. The Penguins had no answer for the Senators’ momentum, and it doomed them from the start.
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Simply put, the Penguins didn’t come ready to play Thursday, and this is not ideal given the fact that they had lost six straight coming into this one and that they’re falling in the standings.
– Before getting to the negatives, I do want to point out that Parker Wotherspoon and Erik Karlsson – along with Rakell – were probably the Penguins’ best players Tuesday. And they seemed to be the only ones really trying hard to seize momentum and get something going.
Early on, there were a few shifts where they were doing everything they could to spark some offense. I didn’t love their defensive play in the latter part of the game, pretty much like everyone else’s. But I at least saw a concerted effort from those two in this one.
– Now, let’s get to the ugly.
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Although I wouldn’t really pin any of the goals against on Silovs, this was his seventh straight loss. The good start to the season that he had seems like a distant memory, and he – like the rest of his team – cannot find any consistency right now.
If the Penguins’ season continues to go south, it wouldn’t be the worst thing to keep him. But the Penguins also have two performing goaltenders in Sergei Murashov and Joel Blomqvist in Wilkes-Barre/Scranton (WBS), and there’s no point in blocking one of them at the NHL level if they show readiness. Which, they have up to this point.
If there is one more iffy start from Silovs, I’d say were approaching decision time for the goaltending situation.
– I said it after the last game, and I’ll say it again: The Penguins need to split up Crosby and Rust.
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The effort is there for Rakell, even if the rust is evident. He’s still playing decent defensive hockey in comparison to the other two, and his production is somewhat tethered to Crosby. But this line is so often caught flat-footed in their own zone that something needs to be tweaked.
Give Rutger McGroarty or Ville Koivunen a few games with Crosby and Rakell, and give Rust some time with Ben Kindel. A shakeup like that could be beneficial for everyone, and having someone like Rust with Kindel and one of McGroarty or Koivunen could give that line a boost production-wise.
– Again, I feel like I’m beating a dead horse. But Letang’s defensive play continues to be a problem. He was beat one-on-one on several occasions Thursday – including on the play that led to the Silovs penalty – and it’s happening with regularity.
There is still some offensive value there, but he really, really needs a lesser role and a more stable partner. Ryan Shea has looked more like a third-pairing defenseman over the last several weeks, so I would give Brett Kulak a try alongside Letang.
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Try that first on the second pairing. And if that doesn’t work? Well, I think it’s probably time to look ahead a little bit because it’s not like fellow right-siders Jack St. Ivany or Connor Clifton have shown much of anything, either.
Harrison Brunicke was lent to Team Canada for the World Junior Championship (WJC), and the Penguins will have a decision to make on him prior to the conclusion of the tournament because Jan. 3 is their 40th game of the season. At that point, if Brunicke and Kindel are still on the NHL roster, they lose a year of restricted free agency.
If things don’t get any better with the Penguins’ backend, there is no reason – purely from a hockey standpoint, anyway – not to give Brunicke some NHL runway for the rest of the season. The team’s blue line is hardly playing much defense as is, so why not let the rookie show what he can do and make some mistakes along the way?
Truthfully, giving Brunicke those minutes can’t look any worse than what Letang and several others have shown defensively this season. And, at the very least, Brunicke can skate and backcheck well.
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After the WJC, split minutes between the second and third pairing so that Brunicke and Letang are playing about the same amount of minutes. If the Penguins continue trending downward, that’s what I’d do, and I don’t think it would be a particularly difficult decision, either. The Penguins are clearly hesitant about sending Brunicke back to junior hockey, so maybe they just shouldn’t, and they can let him take his lumps at the NHL level.
– At this point, I don’t think Kevin Hayes and Danton Heinen are doing all that much to help this team win hockey games. Heinen did hit the iron a few times on Thursday, but his lack of experience at the center position is definitely showing. And with two centers in Evgeni Malkin and Blake Lizotte still out, there are not many options on the roster as is.
Well, I think it’s about time that the Penguins consider making some changes to that NHL roster as is.
Tristan Broz got one game earlier this season before being healthy scratched twice then sent back down, where he’s continued to put up numbers. Avery Hayes supplies a brand of energy that the Penguins could use right now. Boko Imama certainly brings an energy to a lineup, too, and he’s well-liked in the locker room.
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Those three players should be on the first plane to Montreal, and the Penguins should cut ties with underperforming veterans who simply aren’t getting the job done right now. There is too much dead weight on the roster, and the Penguins could use another center as well as more youth.
This roster should not look the same come Saturday or Sunday. We’ll see what happens – or if anything happens – in the coming days. The Penguins are falling fast, and they need to shake things up quickly if they are to salvage their season.
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