Penguins
Penguins Room: Sullivan Slams Commitment, Takes Blame; Letang Claims Frustration

The Pittsburgh Penguins are in trouble. They lost four of the five games on their crucial homestand despite holding their last two opponents to only two shots each in the first period. Yet the Penguins lost both of those games and looked lethargic, at best, in the third period against the Seattle Kraken Tuesday.
Seattle scored a pair of goals 49 seconds apart in the third period, as the Penguins’ defensive zone coverage was more about spectating than engaging. Seattle added an empty netter for a 4-2 win.
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Penguins coach Mike Sullivan sternly chided his team’s willingness to play defense.
“What needs to change is a commitment to play defense. 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,” Sullivan said. “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 detail. We didn’t stop. We didn’t protect the good ice.
“We didn’t get stops in the corners, win puck battles, block shots. It boils down to details. We weren’t willing to do it tonight.”
The Penguins coach also grabbed ownership of the situation, placing blame upon himself for the team’s heartless defending.
“So if I had the answer, I’d fix it. We simply have to do a better job defending in our end zone. And that falls on me,” Sullivan said. “I’ve got to do a better job coaching these guys on our play in our own end and defending away from the puck and making sure that we’re on the same page there.”
Kris Letang
Defenseman Kris Letang echoed the negativity over the Penguins’ lack of defensive zone give-a-damn. Letang acknowledged that even though the Penguins allowed very few shots, their zone coverage was weak. Letang spoke exclusively with Pittsburgh Hockey Now after the game.
In fact, he returned to the theme of poor coverage a couple of times, even after PHN asked what worked well in the first two periods. Letang added the caveat that the team got frustrated by the lack of goals and distracted from the details of their game.
“When you’re in control of that game, the first period, we’re playing well. Maybe we got frustrated about not scoring, and details slipped and opened up the door for them defensively,” Letang said. “We have to do better.”
Penguins captain Sidney Crosby didn’t use the word frustration. He didn’t have to. Instead, Crosby described it and the effects. The words may not read dramatically, but the expression and head shake as he delivered them spoke much louder.
“Hopefully, we realize if we play the right way, we’ll get rewarded. When we play our game, we get opportunities, we generate a lot like we did the last couple (of games),” said Crosby. “So knowing that is important, but at the same time, we’ve got to close out games. So yeah, we need to do it. Whatever it looks like. We just need to find ways to get to points.”
The Penguins are quickly falling behind in the playoff race they fought so hard to rejoin. They’re now four points behind the second-wild card-holding Columbus Blue Jackets, who also have two games in hand. Worse, there are four teams between the Penguins and Columbus.
The Penguins are just about at critical mass after their 1-3-1 homestand.