Penguins Hold Team Meetings, Leaders Answer for Losses, ‘Feel Like Crap’

CRANBERRY, Twp — It was not a pleasant experience for anyone involved. The fans booed loudly at the end of the first period Monday after the Pittsburgh Penguins gave up six goals for the first time in franchise history. Never before had the team yielded that many on home ice, and anyone who witnessed the hockey slaughter will attest it could have been worse.

The Penguins were indeed that bad in the 7-1 loss to the Dallas Stars, and they had a team meeting or meetings to discuss it.

“Anybody has a bad night or something like that, we have to stick as a team and stick with each other. It’s just a question of attitude. Obviously, it didn’t go our way in the first few minutes (against Dallas),” said Kris Letang Tuesday. “We have to limit the damages. We feel like shit, but you have to shake it off and go back to work, and you have to go back to basics. So that’s what we mainly discussed.”

As goalie Alex Nedeljkovic admitted Monday night, the Penguins did indeed have meetings Tuesday morning with video sessions, and it was not pleasant. The team was late to the ice Tuesday, and coach Mike Sullivan held an extended meeting at center ice after practice. Sullivan wouldn’t divulge the contents of the meeting, nor did Evgeni Malkin, other than admitting part of the message was an acknowledgment that everyone was hurting. No one was happy, but things needed to move forward.

Read More: Malkin Apologizes to Fans; Penguins ‘Need to Stop Looking at Each Other’

Watching goal after goal … after goal could not have been pleasant. The mistakes piled up, as did the apathetic play. Tuesday, Bryan Rust was clearly energetic at practice–a tough feat considering the beatdown administered the night before.

“You’ve got to take your lessons. Sometimes, you’ve got to take it on the chin and move forward. Obviously, (Tuesday) wasn’t the most exciting day because you had to kind of face that (Monday) night sucked,” said Rust. “And I think the only way to get out of things like that is to get the energy back, come back out here, and work hard. Sometimes, if you’re not feeling the greatest or things aren’t going great, you have to fake it until you make it. And I think the more you try and get that contagious attitude throughout the room, throughout the ice, I think that just helps us kind of climb out of this hole.”

It has become a thing for the Penguins. The team leaders have had to answer for blown leads and previously weak performances, but things hit rock bottom already Monday. The situation may not improve, but it surely cannot get worse than a historical beatdown in the opening 20 minutes. Not even the 1983-84 Penguins, which were built to be historically bad so the team could draft Mario Lemieux, were as pathetic as the Penguins’ performance Monday.

Lest one thinks the team let it roll off their back, that would be a mistake. The loss hit home, and no one dodged the questions about the impact, mental and physical, though Sullivan’s talk at center ice after practice will remain private.

“Those discussions stay within the context of our team. It was a discussion of the experience we went through yesterday,” Sullivan said.

Letang was particularly hard hit by the game. He was a team-worst minus-4, and his game has suffered with the Penguins’ rising and falling tide. Rust has battled multiple injuries since the beginning of training camp. And much of the lineup has largely been ineffective since the first few games of the season.

It’s been a dark night, but the sun seemed to peak over the horizon last Friday when the Penguins stomped the Washington Capitals for a 4-2 win. Optimism ticked upward. Players spoke of building on it and using it to turn the season around. All of that only made the crashing thud of their optimism even more difficult.

Letang indicated it wasn’t a top-down meeting. The floor was open.

“Everybody has a voice, and it doesn’t matter if you have a letter or you’re a coach. Every single player has to be able to say what they think. And if they have ideas of how to fix things–that we’re not we’re not really good at right now–we can voice them. So it just needs to be an open conversation between each other,” said Letang. “We all feel like crap after a game like that … At the end of the day, you have to look at what we’ve done and how to fix it, find ways to do it, and maybe get back to basics, just try to play as a team, play for the guy next to you and we’ll build off that.”