Crosby ‘Not OK’ With Goal Slump, Calls Scoring ‘Part Of My Job’

Penguins center and captain Sidney Crosby needs five points over the team’s final two games to reach 100 points for the fifth time and the first since 2013-14. But points, and especially goals, have been difficult to come by lately.

Crosby has three points, all assists, over the past eight games. His last goal – two of them, actually – came March 12 against Washington. That’s 10 games without one

Even for the most jaded hockey follower, it would be difficult to say that’s because Crosby is playing poorly. He’s still doing a lot of the things that have compelled Penguins coach Mike Sullivan to repeatedly call Crosby the best 200-foot player in the game.

But there is that goal drought.

“I don’t know,” Crosby said Wednesday when asked about whether his approach to busting a goal drought has changed over the years. “I think you try to evaluate your game as a whole, but (scoring) is part of it.

“Part of my job is putting the puck in the net, so I’ve got to find a way to do that. I don’t think that I’m OK with it, but I also know there’s other parts I need to be good at if it’s not going in.

“So I wouldn’t say I accept it, but I think I try to go out there and get one every night. I think sometimes it goes in easier than others, but this time of year you want to find ways to score.”

If it seems as if Crosby’s slump has come quietly, perhaps that’s because his two-points-in-eight-games stretch has come on the heels of a stretch of 10 goals, 31 points in 17 games.