Pens vs Jackets 2-19-15

[fractalsteel]

Questions about the Birdies.

Will they score tonight?
Will they score but one goal or maybe more?
Can they score a PP goal?
In a crucial situation will the PK unit come up big?
Will the team waste another stellar performance from Fleury?
Will Malkin score?
Will Crosby shoot? Score?
Will Johnston continue to make moves that make the fans shake their heads?
Will a line change go awry costing the team big time?

So many questions about this team.
They are healthy, but the questions are building like a garbage heap. Instead of rounding into fine form they are teetering towards the playoff line.

The team needs to go on a winning streak and they need to play better against their division foes, of which they face 8 more times the rest of the year, minus the playoffs.

Turn it around and GO Pens!

[Legacy User]

Yeah it's probably time to worry. Nearly 60 games in and this was the point (in my estimation) where the team should have gone through a lot of the kinks in the transition and begun trending toward turning the corner to reaping the fruits in time for the coming playoffs. But it seems we're seeing more questions than answers at this point. JR has stated, I think, that he's going to possibly be in the market for one more top 9 winger before deadline. Still a lot of hockey left though I guess.

[Legacy User]

Pens would be down 2-3 goals if not for MAF thus far. Outshot, out-chanced, outplayed.

[fractalsteel]

Yup, Fleury is keeping this close.

Pens had what, two scoring chances and Malkin misses by inches.That is the way it has gone.

Finger biter got behind Pouliot and made a real nice move around MAF who was hung out to dry.

Put 87 and 71 out there together coach.

[Legacy User]

Just saw this quote from Sid posted by the Pens to facebook regarding their divisional record:

"We have to find a way to correct it. Whether it's making sure we make adjustments or realizing that those games need higher energy and emotion. We need to raise our game with that."

They haven't realized that they should be up for divisional/rivalry games? That actually makes sense given what we've seen. Paul Martin is onscreen right now doing an in-game interview talking about how the Pens didn't match the Jackets' intensity in the 1st. That seems to be a real issue. But they are having a better 2nd period.

Good on Geno being there to bury that rebound.

[Legacy User]

Looks like Sid has had enough. That probably should have happened a while ago. Hopefully that's the thing that opens the floodgates for him.

[fractalsteel]

Good for Sid.

[Legacy User]

Happy to see sid finally say fuck it and stick up for himself, he held his own too

[bradshaw2ben]

fugly

[Legacy User]

Pens suck

[Hacksaw Jim Duggan]

I'm on the "this coaching is worse than Bylsma" train now.

Wow.

No adjustments to the lines AT ALL.

Three goals in three games.

Players suck.

[Ice]

I'm on the "this coaching is worse than Bylsma" train now.

Wow.

No adjustments to the lines AT ALL.

Three goals in three games.

Players suck.

Don't worry. We'll be "getting to our game" any time now.

I liked Sid standing up, but it's still galling that he has to do it himself. There are fundamental flaws on this team.

[Donnie Brasco]

Yeah I was all in on mj because it seemed he was quick to dismantle lines when things sputtered. Now it's no different than bylsma.

Is Bennett ever gonna get a shot on the top two lines? I mean what can it hurt to audition him?

The pp overpassing continues to wreck the flow...

[Legacy User]

Without a doubt the personnel decisions have been maddening. These lines have been headscratchers. Why bring in or develop talent if you're not going to use it to its optimum capability? Bringing in premium free agents and playing them in their off positions. And I agree BB needs to be on Malkin's line much more consistently and must be allowed to develop with his linemates, which means allowing him some mistakes to learn from along the way and going through the peaks and valleys with his line mates.

4th in the division as of tonight. I wonder if there's a chance they might go so far as sliding out of a playoff spot.

[Orangesteel]

Pens are a stinking pile of pussy fucking hockey right now. Not even worth my time. Utterly pathetic.

[Hacksaw Jim Duggan]

The Bruins and Panthers would need to pass the Penguins to knock the them out.

The Bruins are only a few points out.

Panthers are 9 points away with a game in hand. The threat is very real, especially if they win that game in hand. Basically the Panthers would need to go into OT once and win three more games than the Penguins the rest of the way to pass them.

[Ice]

I wonder if there's a chance they might go so far as sliding out of a playoff spot.

A month ago, I wouldn't have said it, but there's a chance. There are so many heads up so many of their respective asses on this team I barely even know where to start describing it.

[Legacy User]

Who would have imagined that we would be missing bylsma at this point, just unbelievable

[Ice]

#BabcockWatch

[bradshaw2ben]

Yeah I was all in on mj because it seemed he was quick to dismantle lines when things sputtered. Now it's no different than bylsma.

Is Bennett ever gonna get a shot on the top two lines? I mean what can it hurt to audition him?

The pp overpassing continues to wreck the flow...

The other teams' PK are extending way out to the guys at the point. Guys at the point have to fake shots and attack the goal

[Ice]

attack the goal

That's not how we do things on this teams power play.

[Legacy User]

I think it's safe to say the Mike Johnston honeymoon period is over.

Time to prove he deserves to be in the NHL, and not manning some WCHL scrub team.

[Ice]

I think it's safe to say the Mike Johnston honeymoon period is over.

Time to prove he deserves to be in the NHL, and not manning some WCHL scrub team.

Agreed.

[fractalsteel]

This team is lazy to start, stupid in crucial moments and would seem poorly coached(or they don't care for the coaching staff).
It seems to me in my opinion that this team soured on Johnston and his style back in early January.

The Pens are Nickelback bad, Paula Dean stupid.

Go look at the PP that turned into a shortie... four Pens are on one half of the ice and Comeau decides to gently toss it up the boards where two Jacket players are gathered about mid ice on the other half.
Nice job by Crosby to get back on that cluster fuck.

Fleury is probably cursing himself for signing that extension so early.

[Legacy User]

Fleury is probably cursing himself for signing that extension so early.

Seriously. If I were him, I'd key every goddam car in the players lot, daily.

All the shit he's gotten over the past few seasons (much of it justified, of course), he finally gets it turned around and starts playing lights only to be rewarded with a string of 1-0, 2-1 losses.

[Legacy User]

Its amazing that a team with Geno and sid has so much trouble scoring. They look like there is no chemistry between any of the lines. They do not move as a unit. Horn should be with sid, kun sid and horn was a great line early in the year. Try comeau Geno perron and see what they can do. Or trade kun and bring in jagr to play with Geno and comeau. We need to shake things up

[Jobu]

I was on the "Fire Bylsma" bandwagon...maybe it's NOT the coaching!?!

[Legacy User]

Yeah if we bring in a guy like Babcock and the team still does this shit.......we'll know it was never the coaching as the main culprit and that it's time to start questioning the long term viability of certain guys on this team.

Personally I think a lot of problems could be solved by finally icing lines that make sense, with guys in their most natural positions where they've had the most success and where chemistry has been demonstrated. The fact that this is not happening tells me there's politics at play stopping it from happening. The health factor is no longer a viable excuse.

[fractalsteel]

Fleury is probably cursing himself for signing that extension so early.

Seriously. If I were him, I'd key every goddam car in the players lot, daily.

All the shit he's gotten over the past few seasons (much of it justified, of course), he finally gets it turned around and starts playing lights only to be rewarded with a string of 1-0, 2-1 losses.

He should leave Letang's vehicle alone and maybe only key one side of Malkin's.

Its amazing that a team with Geno and sid has so much trouble scoring. They look like there is no chemistry between any of the lines. They do not move as a unit. Horn should be with sid, kun sid and horn was a great line early in the year. Try comeau Geno perron and see what they can do. Or trade kun and bring in jagr to play with Geno and comeau. We need to shake things up

Not scoring is the $1,000,000 problem/question. Shouldn't be a problem with the guys that see time.

Yeah if we bring in a guy like Babcock and the team still does this shit.......we'll know it was never the coaching as the main culprit and that it's time to start questioning the long term viability of certain guys on this team.

Personally I think a lot of problems could be solved by finally icing lines that make sense, with guys in their most natural positions where they've had the most success and where chemistry has been demonstrated. The fact that this is not happening tells me there's politics at play stopping it from happening. The health factor is no longer a viable excuse.

You would think so(proper players in proper position/lines) so.
If they fail again this year and don't reach the ECF I wonder if Mario has the sack to make a change at the player level. I don't see him ever giving up on Sid(and I'm not speculating that he should) and probably not Malkin.

The team is in every game but recently they find ways to fuck it up at the end. Kunitz taking a stupid penalty against Washington with < 4 minutes. Ward was dangling himself against the boards urging Kunitz to bite and he did. Then Letang had the bad fortune of breaking a stick and there you have a 5 on 3 against a very skilled team.
Last night it was the laziness of the PP setup that led to the shortie that beat them.
Can't score for shit and making bad mistakes at games end will fuck you every time.

[Legacy User]

Just saw this posted at LGP. Spot-on and perfectly translates the way I also feel about this team right now. Phil Bourque nailing it in epic fashion:

Usually by the time I get down here from the broadcast booth, I’ve kind of gathered my thoughts, gathered my emotions. Not so much tonight. I think as a Penguin fan, I think you should be ticked off tonight, because your goaltender laid it all on the line. That’s one of the best goaltending performances I’ve seen in years. He was taking my breath away.

To lose the game like that, it should bother you. It should bother you a lot as a player. I don’t know if anything was said in that room, but it bothers me. I take a lot of pride in working for this organization and what this organization stands for. And what I witnessed out there tonight, it was not Penguin hockey. You had a goaltender that absolutely laid every ounce of energy he had on the line, and you lose the game like that, on a shorthanded goal where he makes the save and you just don’t cover up Brandon Dubinsky? That should really stick in your craw to the point where things should change after this game tonight.

Because I think enough is enough. Enough has gone on here, and everybody’s kind of being patient: ‘OK, we’re gonna be fine. OK, we’ve got Malkin, we’ve got Crosby, we have Letang.’ It should get to the point of unacceptable, what’s going on the ice. … It’s not about working hard.

Don’t get me wrong, you did some good things against Washington, but the way that you unraveled after the Ovechkin two-hand chop on Letang, you end up shooting yourself in the foot. And you come back, and you don’t have a great start here against a team that’s clearly out of the playoffs, it’s frightening. In their room, they’re thinking ‘We’re going down with the ship. we’re going down swining. we’re going down and we’re gonna empty the tank every night.’ They beat the Philadelphia Flyers, they come rolling in here. and they snatch two points from the Pittsburgh Penguins.

I don’t know what the comments are from the players, but you should feel like this is rock bottom. Just because of the way Marc-Andre Fleury played. Sid’s trying to fire himself up, he’s trying to fire the troops up by fighting Brandon Dubinsky, but I don’t know. In my estimation, I see too much talent and too much character on the ice and in the room for this to go on any longer than tonight.

(GM Jim Rutherford is) a guy that’s more likely to pull the trigger in the next few days than wait for March 2. On top of that, if you don’t have that fear of being traded, you might want to start having the fear of not making the playoffs. You might think you’re all nice and cozy where you are right now, but guess what: All of a sudden, when you pick up the paper tomorrow or you go online and look at pittsburghpenguins.com or NHL.com, the Penguins are going to be in the wild-card position. They’re No. 7 right now. And guess what: The Boston Bruins aren’t that far behind, and the Florida Panthers are not that far behind. And if you continue to slide like this, I don’t think you want to go into the last 15 games of the regular season going ‘holy moley, we are two points from being out of a wild-card position. And the way things are going right now, that reality should be staring you in the face right now.”

Not with that talent and what ownership has done to build a team to win now. And that’s the thing: I know there’s a little bit of a sense (where) everyone is looking at the Metropolitan Division. Now we’re four games below .500 in the Metropolitan, and the teams we beat are the teams that are not in the playoffs for the most part. You’re not beating the Rangers, you’re not beating the Caps, you’re not even beating the Flyers for that (matter).

There’s kind of been this ‘Don’t worry. We’ll be fine. Don’t look at the stats. Don’t look at the numbers so much.’ That’s kind of what you’re hearing. You know what, at this point, you better look at the numbers, because it’s a reality. It’s not a small sample size anymore. It’s a reality that right now, this team is not good enough, and there should be some real, real healthy fear of what’s going on right now.

http://www.sportingnews.com/nhl/story/2 ... eni-malkin