Post-Game Talk: Pens 4 Habs 0 | Beau + The Boys Win One for the Duper

[Will Hunting]

Not to nitpick too much but since the first seven or so games of the season Horny hasn't impressed me all that much. And his production has taken a noticeable drop.

He needs to go back to Sid. He has looked lost with Malkin. Even in the games when he was not producing with Sid, you could see that the chemistry was there. Not magic, but decent chemistry for sure. Now, there´s nothing in that TOP6, except of some occasional individual efforts by Sid or Geno. MJ needs to figure this out, it´s not that complicated.

At the start of the season, Geno was struggling ES. Right now, he´s still struggling in ES and Sid is in the even worse situation. We need at least one of them being put in the right position. Since we don´t know what is the right position for Malkin, we should at least make it easier for Crosby and give PH back to him.

 

[Michael8771*]

He needs to go back to Sid. He has looked lost with Malkin. Even in the games when he was not producing with Sid, you could see that the chemistry was there. Not magic, but decent chemistry for sure. Now, there´s nothing in that TOP6, except of some occasional individual efforts by Sid or Geno. MJ needs to figure this out, it´s not that complicated.

At the start of the season, Geno was struggling ES. Right now, he´s still struggling in ES and Sid is in the even worse situation. We need at least one of them being put in the right position. Since we don´t know what is the right position for Malkin, we should at least make it easier for Crosby and give PH back to him.

If they want to put Kunitz with Geno and slide Horny down with Sid I'm fine with that. I just don't want to stack one line again.

 

[cygnus47]

Kill two birds and put Kunitz with Geno too.

Duper (at least he skates hard....) - Sid - Horny
Kunitz - Malkin - Bennett/Comeau
Comeau/Bennett - Sutter - Downie
Spaling - Goc - Anyone but....

 

[ProgOg]

Stats picking is always fun, so here:

NHL Public Relations @PR_NHL
Marc-Andre Fleury is 1st goalie in @penguins history to post 4 shutouts in 9-start span. He is 8-1-0 w/ 1.56 GAA and .944 SV% in that span.

 

[Honour Over Glory]

I would rather see Payerl up over Sill, dude is a hard guy to knock down. He's like the opposite of Adams.

 

[yuri28]

He needs to go back to Sid. He has looked lost with Malkin. Even in the games when he was not producing with Sid, you could see that the chemistry was there. Not magic, but decent chemistry for sure. Now, there´s nothing in that TOP6, except of some occasional individual efforts by Sid or Geno. MJ needs to figure this out, it´s not that complicated.

At the start of the season, Geno was struggling ES. Right now, he´s still struggling in ES and Sid is in the even worse situation. We need at least one of them being put in the right position. Since we don´t know what is the right position for Malkin, we should at least make it easier for Crosby and give PH back to him.

I'm not sure what games were you watching.
The first 2-3 shifts they played together were probably some of the best shifts of any Pens line this season (think it was in the first game against Rangers).
Then they struggled a bit but to be honest, they didn't have many good pucks to play for some reason (one of them being Geno's bad FOs play this season) and when they had, they created chances.....just didn't go in.
Also, don't overrate the Sid-Horny chemistry, their numbers were widely inflated by the incredible PP stats of our team at the beginning of the season.
At ES, they were not that great.

Anyway, i certainly wouldn't be against getting Horny back with Sid and putting Geno with Kunitz and Bennett.

 

[Will Hunting]

I'm not sure what games were you watching.
The first 2-3 shifts they played together were probably some of the best shifts of any Pens line this season (think it was in the first game against Rangers).
Then they struggled a bit but to be honest, they didn't have many good pucks to play, for some reason.
Anyway, i wouldn't be against getting Horny back with Sid and putting Geno with Kunitz and Bennett.

So, except of those 2 shifts, you are basically agreeing with me.. Geno was dominant against the Rangers, but I felt like it was more about his individual effort than the chemistry. Also, there was a game in Toronto before that and it was quite mediocre for Geno-Hornqvist, too.

TOP6 needs some switches, right now both Sid & Geno are getting very little help and it´s not working. You have to make sure that at least one of them is fine, this is clearly not that case.

As for Bennett, it looks like he is playing his best hockey on the 3rd line. Sutter is a great fit for him and he´s probably feeling less pressure there compared to playing with Sid/Geno.

As I´ve said and many others too, Dupuis-Sid-Horn .. Kunitz-Malkin-xxx(keep BB on the 3rd line, tho). Separating Kunitz and Crosby is a key now. It would also be a message sent to Kunitz, you can´t tolerate a play like this longterm.

EDIT: As for Sid-Horns chemistry.. well, I´m not overrating it. I even said that it wasn´t some magic, but it was definitely better than Malkin-Hornqvist. They were getting those looks pretty permanently despite not scoring in some games.

 

[M0NTY26]

Because the top six is a slowly unfolding dumpster fire and Bennett is an obvious candidate to help it out.

Not hard.

I'm not saying our top six doesn't need help, because it needs two wingers, BUT as long as we're producing WINS, does it really matter? So the other teams top pairing can shut down Malkin or Sid because they don't have enough help, but their middle and bottom pairings can't shut down our third line, because they are better than 3rd liners.

I mean, the scoring titles are great, but at some point, enough is enough. I'd trade every single scoring title for a league title.

 

[chethejet]

He is interchangeable as are most wingers. The coach wants a fit for sure, but nothing wrong with seeing who fits where this time of year. After the trade deadline, the push for who is where will be more settled.

 

[AjaxTelamon]

I'm not saying our top six doesn't need help, because it needs two wingers, BUT as long as we're producing WINS, does it really matter? So the other teams top pairing can shut down Malkin or Sid because they don't have enough help, but their middle and bottom pairings can't shut down our third line, because they are better than 3rd liners.

I mean, the scoring titles are great, but at some point, enough is enough. I'd trade every single scoring title for a league title.

And that's what wins in the playoffs too, matchups you can exploit in a series. And with all the belly-aching about lines, Sid's line carried the Toronto game with 2 goals, Geno's line carried the NYR game with 2 goals, and the 3rd line carried this game.

We need another winger or two to fill out the top 6, but we have solid scoring depth right now, and it's winning us hockey games against good teams.

 

[Ugene Magic]

Nice to see Beau finally break out and flash the skills and performance we know he's capable of.

The team seems much more consistent defensively this season.

Nice to have a big time 3rd line again too. It's been a few years.

I agree 1000%.

 

[ColePens]

I love that people are bringing up Goc. He's been outstanding this year. Way better than I would have expected and he's given crappy linemates AND limited minutes. He's been tremendous on the PK, in the dot, and brings a lot of energy (surprisingly because he didn't do that in DB's system) each shift he gets.

Also... sending Sill back for Farnham would be too much fun. Farnham and Downie running around will either be the funniest thing or the most frustrating thing as a Pens fan.

 

[madinsomniac]

I love that people are bringing up Goc. He's been outstanding this year. Way better than I would have expected and he's given crappy linemates AND limited minutes. He's been tremendous on the PK, in the dot, and brings a lot of energy (surprisingly because he didn't do that in DB's system) each shift he gets.

Also... sending Sill back for Farnham would be too much fun. Farnham and Downie running around will either be the funniest thing or the most frustrating thing as a Pens fan.

That begs the questions... what is the record for penalty kill time in one period and how quickly would we break it?

 

[wgknestrick]

I did a paint for y'all

This totally needs to turn into those daily signs unions hang up at work. We need to see it on every GDT. Excellent idea, good sir.

BB played his best game of his career last night after I bad mouthed him, saying he is undeserving of the top 6 based on his play. If he can keep this momentum going (without resetting his sign above to 0), he will change my mind.

Sutter is in freaking god mode. This is about 3 games straight where I would say he's been our best C. He just plays a solid 200ft game and deserves an A on his sweater. Jordan Staal trade looking better every year.

I hope Dupers is OK. I have a strange feeling about his absence being Vokoun, Letang, or Maatta - ish. I don't get a good vibe from some of the reactions on the team about it.......just hope it's nothing long term.

MAF played one of his better games last night. He absorbed tons of rebounds and played the puck well. His best games are when he doesn't have to make that "big save". I still think Greiss is better than him (and all but a couple NHL goalies), but MAF has improved.

I still want to see him stand up when the puck is behind the net. He can't get back into position fast enough when he's down on his knees and the puck comes out front. There are few goaltenders that go down as soon as he does when the puck goes behind the goal line. MAF could greatly improve his game by standing up "more" in all aspects.

Letang is still playing way too wide. He caused another breakaway last night, but lucked out with MTL playing it back into his backcheck on the trailing player. He has to slide over to the middle and back when the puck is on his off side. Its bantum D stuff.

4th line is no better than last year. Adams is worse and needs to be benched.

 

[CanadianPensFan1]

Well that was awesome.

+++++ 3rd line, overall defense, Fleury
- top 6, 4th line

That pretty much sums it up.

Oh .. is it just me or does anyone else cringe when Bennett tries to throw a check or stretch for the puck or .. do anything other than skate in a straight line? Every time he did something that wasnt a simple move, I expected him to get hurt. Ooops.

 

[Shwag33]

Fun fact, the pens haven given up 35 goals; next closest in the metro is washington with 50 GA.

 

[ColePens]

^^ Not a lot of people will understand what you mean about too wide, but I have seen letang exploited a few times by cheating over to the weak side winger. It opens up the middle of the ice and doesn't allow our strong side defender to step up/gap up. He's been burned probably about 4-5 times already this year w/ the same exact play. I don't know if that's by design or not, but it doesn't seem like it as it isn't happening to any other defense pairings.

As for your comment on the 4th line... disagree completely. It's been much better. The usage of the 4th line being one of the biggest components. Johnston isn't just sending them out against anyone and he sure as hell isn't allowing them to steal offensive faceoffs when our top guys are ready to go.

 

[Shwag33]

Yup.

I appreciate the idea on paper. But it's not working out so great in practice. At least with the current roster.

You mean have the best win % on the NHL?


I'm all for trying new things and potentially moving bennett around, but too many of you are confusing Sid and Geno scoring with the success of the team.

Having a 3rd line that can score 3 goals in a game is freaking huge. Having crosby/malkin go agianst the other teams top pairs in the playoffs they will probably still get shut down at times even with bennett on the wing.

Need a 3rd line that can pitch in if they are going against the weaker pairing D-men.

 

[madinsomniac]

^^ Not a lot of people will understand what you mean about too wide, but I have seen letang exploited a few times by cheating over to the weak side winger. It opens up the middle of the ice and doesn't allow our strong side defender to step up/gap up. He's been burned probably about 4-5 times already this year w/ the same exact play. I don't know if that's by design or not, but it doesn't seem like it as it isn't happening to any other defense pairings.

As for your comment on the 4th line... disagree completely. It's been much better. The usage of the 4th line being one of the biggest components. Johnston isn't just sending them out against anyone and he sure as hell isn't allowing them to steal offensive faceoffs when our top guys are ready to go.

After about the second game of the season Adams suddenly stopped taking extended shifts, which I always suspected were not by dimesesign. his Ice time is usually around 5 minutes of even strength time, a little more in blowouts. All last year during the regular season the guy had less than ten minutes of Ice time in only 9 games, and only one of those was less than 9 minutes... to date this season he has 8 games with less than 10 minutes of Ice time, and 7 of those are less than 9 minutes.

The 4th line is used in reasonable manner, not out taking key faceoffs in the offensive zone while trailing late. It mostly is PKrs filling low value shifts to keep better players fresh.

 

[wgknestrick]

^^ Not a lot of people will understand what you mean about too wide, but I have seen letang exploited a few times by cheating over to the weak side winger. It opens up the middle of the ice and doesn't allow our strong side defender to step up/gap up. He's been burned probably about 4-5 times already this year w/ the same exact play. I don't know if that's by design or not, but it doesn't seem like it as it isn't happening to any other defense pairings.

As for your comment on the 4th line... disagree completely. It's been much better. The usage of the 4th line being one of the biggest components. Johnston isn't just sending them out against anyone and he sure as hell isn't allowing them to steal offensive faceoffs when our top guys are ready to go.

4th line's issues are being masked by Goc's play in D zone. Adams and Sill need to go ASAP because they can't get puck out of own zone on the boards. Neither of those guys generate zone time, shots, scoring opts, etc. Nothing positive happens when they are out there. They don't even hit many people.

We should be able to put our 4th line out for D zone shifts and have them "punt" the puck into the Ozone for the next shift. That's all I want out of them. We have to start somewhere, because now they just exist.

60% of the shots are for the other team when Adams is on the ice......while 67% of the goals are. Those numbers just aren't NHL worthy and will eventually cost us games. He is getting dominated (Sill too). There are only so many places you can hide a dumpster fire before it's found. Those numbers aren't better than last year either. It will only take time for this to become a problem as the goals against add up. We should shoot for 50:50 on the 4th line. They need to be a net 0, not a net negative for this team.

It is pretty obvious what Letang is doing (not doing) out there that needs to be fixed. I can't understand why it isn't fixed though with this coaching staff.

I rewind every break-away against that we give up and more likely than not:

#1 Letang is on the ice.
#2 Letang's guy (IMO) is the one who gets the break away.
#3 Letang missed him because he was up on the weak side forward (by the boards, with puck on other side of ice).

This leaves the entire center of the ice wide open with Letang no way of covering it. Letang is the only one consistently making this mistake so I don't know if it's him or something the coaching staff is allowing "just him" to do. It needs to stop though.

 

[Dipsy Doodle]

You mean have the best win % on the NHL?


I'm all for trying new things and potentially moving bennett around, but too many of you are confusing Sid and Geno scoring with the success of the team.

Having a 3rd line that can score 3 goals in a game is freaking huge. Having crosby/malkin go agianst the other teams top pairs in the playoffs they will probably still get shut down at times even with bennett on the wing.

Need a 3rd line that can pitch in if they are going against the weaker pairing D-men.

Except our 3rd line has been fine at ES all year, even without Bennett, while our scoring lines have been out of sorts.

So we're using our most naturally-skilled winger to bolster a line that doesn't need bolstering as our superstar centers struggle outside of the PP trying to make due with Hornqvist, a dog-****ing Kunitz, and an assortment of bottom 6ers.

 

[madinsomniac]

You mean have the best win % on the NHL?


I'm all for trying new things and potentially moving bennett around, but too many of you are confusing Sid and Geno scoring with the success of the team.

Having a 3rd line that can score 3 goals in a game is freaking huge. Having crosby/malkin go agianst the other teams top pairs in the playoffs they will probably still get shut down at times even with bennett on the wing.

Need a 3rd line that can pitch in if they are going against the weaker pairing D-men.

Well, to be fair The Pens arent undefeated and havent won all their games 10-0. You can see how they totally suck as constructed right now....

 

[radapex]

Not just the system, also personnel decisions. Gladams and Scudapik being used the way they were was just begging for momentum shifts and goals against.

If Bylsma was still HC, we'd have got a healthy dose of Glass+Adams out there after going up 4-0. Johnston wanted to balance the minutes, so what'd he do? He shelters both Sill and Adams by making a simple change - move Sill up with Malkin-Hornqvist, and Spaling down with Goc-Adams. Once you get past the initial shock, the change made a lot of sense -- it allowed him to increase their TOI without creating a total liability on the ice.

 

[ColePens]

4th line's issues are being masked by Goc's play in D zone. Adams and Sill need to go ASAP because they can't get puck out of own zone on the boards. Neither of those guys generate zone time, shots, scoring opts, etc. Nothing positive happens when they are out there. They don't even hit many people.

We should be able to put our 4th line out for D zone shifts and have them "punt" the puck into the Ozone for the next shift. That's all I want out of them. We have to start somewhere, because now they just exist.

60% of the shots are for the other team when Adams is on the ice......while 67% of the goals are. Those numbers just aren't NHL worthy and will eventually cost us games. He is getting dominated (Sill too). There are only so many places you can hide a dumpster fire before it's found. Those numbers aren't better than last year either. It will only take time for this to become a problem as the goals against add up. We should shoot for 50:50 on the 4th line. They need to be a net 0, not a net negative for this team.

It is pretty obvious what Letang is doing (not doing) out there that needs to be fixed. I can't understand why it isn't fixed though with this coaching staff.

I rewind every break-away against that we give up and more likely than not:

#1 Letang is on the ice.
#2 Letang's guy (IMO) is the one who gets the break away.
#3 Letang missed him because he was up on the weak side forward (by the boards, with puck on other side of ice).

This leaves the entire center of the ice wide open with Letang no way of covering it. Letang is the only one consistently making this mistake so I don't know if it's him or something the coaching staff is allowing "just him" to do. It needs to stop though.

Yeah I mean you are preaching to the choir when it comes to Sill/Adams. They both haven't played up to NHL standard. We are soooooo close to having Comeau and Goc or Spaling and Goc on the 4th line. So close. That's when this 4th line will start thriving.

As for Letang... it's been pretty well documented. He's either amazing or you shake your head wondering what the hell just happened. I'll take a somewhere inbetween

 

[BlindWillyMcHurt]

You mean have the best win % on the NHL?


I'm all for trying new things and potentially moving bennett around, but too many of you are confusing Sid and Geno scoring with the success of the team.

Having a 3rd line that can score 3 goals in a game is freaking huge. Having crosby/malkin go agianst the other teams top pairs in the playoffs they will probably still get shut down at times even with bennett on the wing.

Need a 3rd line that can pitch in if they are going against the weaker pairing D-men.

The depth won't suffer because Spaling will be moved down to where he belongs. That line has had success earlier in the season. A third line of Spaling/Sutter/Downie is certainly nothing to sneeze at and should be plenty productive. And I'm sorry but a third line of all right handers is not really a sustainable one, anyway. That might sound like rigid thinking but it's just too unconventional to work for long.

Whittling the argument down to "lol -- u guyz r just worried about scoring titlez!" is ridiculous. If we haven't learned about how important it is to make sure the top six is firing on as many cylinders as possible... especially as the season moves on... then I really don't know what to say. If a good chunk of the solution is potentially already in-house then it just totally baffles me that they wouldn't want to at least try it after a few more games of Bennett building confidence on L3 with his buddy Sutter. And I think they will... because it makes sense.

Saying that everything is peachy because Crosby/Malkin are getting their points on the powerplay is also ridiculous. I mean... that's great... but I don't give a pale turd about their points. It isn't about that. If the top two lines aren't productive ES (and they aren't) then there are going to be pretty big problems. And by productive I don't even necessarily mean scoring... I'll even rate creating good chances as being productive. But that isn't even happening. At all. A trade is going to have to be made, regardless but Bennett was a guy drafted for playing on a scoring line. If he's being productive... you move him ASAP to, yes... a scoring line.