Penguins/NHL
Power Play Woes Doom Penguins’ in Loss
Deserved a better fate?
Maybe but these things usually even out as the Penguins have gotten some W’s so far this season when they shouldn’t have.
Without three of their top-5 defensemen as Kris Letang is now on the shelf, the Penguins laid out a blueprint defensively in the first and second period of really how they need to defend whether they have a full roster or not. There were a lot of things to like in how they defended 5 vs 5. For whatever reason, the Penguins always seem to do this when they’re ravished with injuries at certain spots. A light will go off that this is how they need to play but it rarely continues when the roster gets back to full strength.
Another storyline out of the loss is a little goaltender controversy is brewing with Casey DeSmith being the much more consistent goaltender so far and the General Manager who was higher on Tristan Jarry than the [hide] coach no longer being here. Sullivan has a lot of trust in DeSmith, so we’ll see where this goes in the coming weeks and who gets the start Saturday night.
At the end of the day, there is no reason to over-analyze the Penguins loss.
An 0-6 night on the power play, while managing just seven shots on goal in six chances.
Clicking at just 13% on the season, even when the Penguins score a power play goal this season, the unit just doesn’t look right nor a threat.
“It looks like we’re looking for a better play that’s not there, said Mike Sullivan after the loss. I just think we’re in a little bit of a mindset where we’re a little too robotic and predictable. We’ve got to just free up our minds a little bit and the best way to do that, in my experience, is just to shoot the puck and create opportunity off of that.”
Sullivan is spot on with the viewpoint that the top unit is “too robotic and predictable”. Evgeni Malkin’s indecisiveness with the puck at the point and lack of power in his shot is making the unit far too easy to defend and there’s just not enough movement right now where opponents are rotating up high right into where the puck is headed.
GM Search will be fast and furious this week
Tuesday Morning Developments on the Penguins GM Search………
Pittsburgh’s significant interest in Tom Fitzgerald will result in Fitzgerald getting his contract extended for his General Manager role with the Devils. The Devils plan to officially kill the noise as the two sides began negotiations To read this insider news, subscribe to get “Inside Access”!
— Chris Drury back in? The Penguins were initially led to believe permission was unlikely to be granted by the Rangers, but the Rangers are now believed to be leaning in the direction to accommodate an interview after some initial pushback of sticking to their standard of not allowing executives to interview during a season being played. As mentioned before, Drury will get a serious look from the Pens brass.
— The Penguins search this week is being described as fast and furious. Take in around 12-14 interviews, get the list down to around 5 by end of the weekend and possibly have the search wrapped up by the end of the following week.
And the sense around the league is that it’s going to be anyone’s ball game. There was going to be one favorite in this search if permission was allowed and that was Tom Fitzgerald.
Of the candidates (also including Chris Drury for now as permission looks to be heading in that direction) we can confirm, through league and team sources, the Penguins have scheduled interviews or talks with this week, one NHL Source Monday night grouped the following in tiers leading into the initial Interviews of where the hierarchy is believed to be on the Penguins list:
Tier 1:: To read this insider news, subscribe to get “Inside Access”!
There’s a few others being kicked around internally that Pittsburgh hasn’t rule out speaking too.
One name that’s been brought up in the organization is Minnesota Wild To read this insider news, subscribe to get “Inside Access”!
MORE BUZZ
Where is Jason Botterill in all of this?
Could always be a smoke screen but the messaging surrounding Jason Botterill continues to be the same in that neither To read this insider news, subscribe to get “Inside Access”!
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