Penguins Grades: Internal Frustration and Imbalance

LAS VEGAS — The actions belied many of the words used by the Pittsburgh Penguins after getting skunked 4-0 by the Vegas Golden Knights at T-Mobile Arena.

The Penguins were visibly frustrated, if not disgusted, with themselves after the game.

Players slammed pads into their hockey bags. Sighs were audible. There was very little cross-chatter and certainly no backslapping or jovial moments following the game.

Even the joy of staying with the team past the NHL trade deadline was soured by the let-down defeat and the trades of popular teammates over the past three days.

After some rough performances Friday, internal frustration was immediately present. An emotional Alex Nedeljkovic meant to praise winger Bryan Rust’s care and intensity. Still, in the heat of the moment, it sounded like criticism of others instead of the verbal applause for Rust that he intended. He later clarified.

“It’s not good enough to just go out there and play. You have to go out and compete and outwork other teams,” Nedeljkovic said. “And part of the doing that is how Rusty did that, taking the puck and sacrificing his body to make a play. We need to feed off of that.”

Rust blocked a heavy shot late in the second period. In pain, he stayed on the ice to finish his shift before exiting to the locker room. Rust returned for the third period.

“I went back out there. I’ll be fine,” he told Pittsburgh Hockey Now.

The dichotomy of the Penguins lineup was painfully apparent. The better forwards shined while there were passengers aplenty.

Rust “will be” fine is much different than “is fine,” but that’s the blood and guts effort of which the Penguins clearly need more. Much, much more.

The Penguins were at odds with their performance. The pain of losing is becoming too common, and the need to push back against it is growing. Yet the reality, as evidenced by a handful of recent games, is that even when the Penguins bring their A-game, it’s difficult to win.

There is now a large talent gap within the Penguins lineup, and when some of the lower lineup players struggle as they did Friday, it only compounds the situation. Even Ryan “Bobby” Shea, as teammates recently dubbed him for his recent offensive explosion, had a rough one.

Shea signed a new one-year contract Friday and will be with the Penguins next year. The elation of getting a new deal was somewhat squashed Friday night.

Shea didn’t hide from it.

“My game is getting better every game. Today was not good for me, and I thought it was a pathetic effort from me, to be honest,” said Shea. “I’m excited by (the contract). It seems like all of the hard work throughout the year has paid off.”

Make no mistake, the Penguins will have a rocky road the rest of the way. They have gone from inconsistent underachievers with a few overachievers like Shea to potentially one of the worst teams in the league.

The Penguins really didn’t feed off the gutsy plays or momentum built by Rust or the star players. The top of the Penguins lineup provided ample spark and opportunity, which was unheeded by the rest.

On the ice, the Penguins didn’t stack offensive chances or sustain offensive pressure. There were a few eyebrow-raising moments, such as Evgeni Malkin flying past a pair of Golden Knights defensemen like it was 2009. Rickard Rakell dipped and deke past defenders for a tight chance, too.

However, despite equalized statistics in the first 40 minutes, the Penguins trailed 2-0 and weren’t making the Golden Knights sweat. The Penguins certainly were not physical.

Coach Mike Sullivan shuffled the defense pairings in the third period, but that only seemed to make matters worse.

The struggling goalie allowed a softie early in the third period. Then, the defense corps exacerbated the coming dirt nap when Mark Stone skated by for a breakaway goal, completely undetected by Vladislav Kolyachonok.

The Penguins’ play in the first two periods looked far better on paper than in real life, at least part of the team.

“I’m not sure (that I agree it didn’t come together). I thought we were pretty good through the first couple of periods,” Rust told PHN. “We had some looks, had some O-zone time, and there were some good scoring chances. Obviously, having to kill three penalties wasn’t ideal, but we did a good job against a power play that’s been hot as of late. I think the third period, for whatever reason, we just didn’t bring it.”

The third period was an undeniable flatline inside an arena known as the Fortress.

Penguins Grades

There were plenty of Fs to hand out.

The Defensemen:

Erik Karlsson, Ryan Shea, Vladislav Kolyachonok, Matt Grzelcyk.

The Penguins defensemen combined for three shots, and Ryan Graves had two of them. Neither of Graves’s shots were dangerous.

The statistic is further dumbfounding after the Penguins worked specifically on low-to-high plays in practice on Thursday. Each of the Penguins’ D-men allowed the Golden Knights to skate by uncontested. Karlsson made a few more astonishing lackadaisical plays, one by his own net that gifted Stone an uncontested chance.

Graves was no better than the group, but he wasn’t victimized.

The defensemen submitted a performance as bad as any this year.

Forwards

The Forwards were a group of two: The top line with Sidney Crosby and the bottom nine. The separation in the Penguins lineup was staggering.

Rickard Rakell, Crosby, and Rust had 12 scoring chances. The remainder of the lines had 10, and five of those were from the Evgeni Malkin line.

The Penguins’ bottom-six crew generated five scoring chances and allowed 15, according to NaturalStatTrick.com.

Newly acquired Tommy Novak had a rough night as the third-line center. He won just two of six faceoffs, and the line with Danton Heinen and Philip Tomasino was on the wrong end of nine scoring chances (SC) and seven high-danger chances (HDSC).

They generated just four SCs and two HDSCs. They were largely kept to the perimeter and quiet.

Penalty Kill: A

Three first-period penalties could have spelled disaster, but the PK didn’t allow a shot on the first VGK power play, only three combined shots on the next two chances. It was the one area of the game that cannot be questioned.