The Penguins held the Seattle Kraken to just two shots on goal through one period and total of 10 shots allowed after forty minutes. Yet, it was another night where the Penguins just couldn’t close out a game.

Seattle scored twice 49 seconds apart in the third to erase a 2-1 deficit that saw the Penguins night come crashing down. Pittsburgh let Jamie Oleksiak walk into the zone with respect and fear like he’s Cale Makar to tie the game at 2-2 as Evgeni Malkin gives him a love tap on the way past him. Just Alumni-Game like defense there by 71………

Then moments later the Eeli Toivanen go-ahead goal was just a lot of puck watching and not being in lanes from the Penguins top line where all five players on the ice are pretty much caught on the strong side of the puck. Pittsburgh had 5-on-3 numbers from an innocent Kraken zone entry that led to the go-ahead goal in the back of their net.

  1. Zone Entry
  2. PIT>SEA
  3. Breakdown

Lazy defense that Mike Sullivan fuming and everything that went wrong with this club in the first six to seven weeks of the season has reared its ugly head again during this homestand. These weren’t mistakes by young players. The Oleksiak goal you had your second line on the ice and so-called top pairing D in Marcus Pettersson/Kris Letang. Toivanen goal the top-line was on the ice in a tied hockey game.

“What needs to change is the commitment to play defense,” said Sullivan. “That’s what I think. And we weren’t willing to play defense. We didn’t spend a lot of time in our end tonight, but the time that we did, we weren’t committed to play the right way. They scored two goals in the third period on nonevent scenarios. It wasn’t like we were under siege, but we didn’t pay attention to details.”

‘Nonevent scenarios’ was spot on by Sullivan.

The belief in the organization is Pittsburgh will have to have some separation in the wildcard chase by the time the Four Nations Tournament ends for Kyle Dubas To read this insider news, subscribe to get “Inside Access”!

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— Penguins Goaltending is Something Else.

Tristan Jarry | 22 GP, .886 SV%

Alex Nedeljkovic | 19 GP, .886 SV%

*66th, 67th ranked Save Percentage in the NHL*

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: Penguins asking price on Marcus Pettersson changing? [hide]The Penguins for months have kind of taken the Jake Guentzel model in shopping deals for Pettersson, looking for quality over quantity. Since early November they’ve aggressively sought a return that could land them a Nils Hoglander + a Vasily Ponomarev (type prospect) return. Whispers are Pittsburgh is no longer dead-set on those type of returns. Teams believe you offer Pittsburgh a first-round pick with nothing else attached, their accepting that offer this morning………[/hide] How bad did the Penguins negotiate against themselves in the summer of 2023 with the Tristan Jarry contract? Jarry’s agent Craig Oster had To read this insider news, subscribe to get “Inside Access”!

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