Locked On Penguins - Daily Podcast On The Pittsburgh Penguins - A power play goal was all the Penguins needed!

Episode Date: December 21, 2022

How about that win? The Pittsburgh Penguins were able to take down the New York Rangers by a score of 3-2 on Tuesday night and yes, there's a lot to get into. Hunter stars the show with the defining moment in this game, which of course was Evgeni Malkin's power-play goal. He looks at how Rickard Rakell was able to draw that penalty and how Malkin had a perfect shot past Shesterkin, which is how you beat him. He also credits Bryan Rust for getting some redemption and showing another way to beat one of the best goaltenders in the league. He then analyzes Tristan Jarry's performance after he held the fort for the first half of the game and then continued to make timely saves when the Penguins got the lead. He then looks at how Guentzel and Crosby continued to crush the Rangers before having no sympathy about the no-call on Brian Dumoulin at the end of the game. All that, plus much more on this episode of Locked On Penguins.Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!Built BarBuilt Bar is a protein bar that tastes like a candy bar. Go to builtbar.com and use promo code “LOCKEDON15,” and you’ll get 15% off your next order.BetOnlineBetOnline.net has you covered this season with more props, odds and lines than ever before. BetOnline – Where The Game Starts!NHTSADrive high, get a DUI. Click HERE to learn more.Athletic GreensTo make it easy, Athletic Greens is going to give you a FREE 1 year supply of immune-supporting Vitamin D AND 5 FREE travel packs with your first purchase. All you have to do is visit athleticgreens.com/NHLNETWORK Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hello, Penguins fans, happy Wednesday. Good morning to you on this Wednesday morning. Recording this at about 8.50 in the morning. I'm the host of the Lockdown Penguins Podcast, Hunter Hodes, Penguins 3, Rangers 2. We're going to get all into it for this episode of the Lockdown Penguins podcast. Going to what really changed the game for the Penguins. How it kind of looked similar to Game 5 in this series between these two teams last year, except no one decided to throw an elbow to someone's head.

We're also going to get into PowerPlay staying hot, Tristan Jari's performance, Sidney Crosby and Jake Gensel continuing to terrorize the Rangers and so much more from one of the best games of the season for the Pittsburgh Penguins. So it's all coming up right after this drop. You're Locked-on Penguins. Your daily podcast on the Pittsburgh Penguins. Part of the Locked-on Podcast Network.

Your team every day. Hello, welcome to another edition of the Locked-on Penguins podcast. I'm your host, Hunter Hodesmer, to follow me on Twitter. at Hunter Hode. You also follow the shows, Twitter, at Eleanor Sport Penguins. And, of course, thank you all so much for making this your first listen of the day. I have the dog right over here. He was excited about the win, but, you know, he is not,

he's just waiting for my mom's dog to come back from the walk. But again, Penguins 3, Rangers 2, got the final score right, will take the W with that. Penguins are back to third place in the Metropolitan Division. These two teams will not play again until March. So a lot of time until then. But what a game this was. The Penguins had nothing.

And I mean nothing through the first 25, 30, 31, 32 minutes. They were dead in the water, gliding around. Didn't look like they cared about playing this game. They were just saying, hey, you know, screw it. It's one of those typical mid to late December games. They're getting bullied. But that all changed. When Ricard Raquel delivered a big hit in the corner of the boards on what was at Philip Heidel.

Jandre Miller retaliated took a penalty and the Penguins PowerPlay, which had scored in eight straight games, the longest street for this team since 2012, 2013, when they had those really good power plays, went to work. And, again, Malkin was able to tie the game at one in the second period. Beautiful screen from Raquel to make sure Igor Shasturkin didn't see it. And Malkin with that beautifully placed shot right under the blocker of Shisterkin. And, you know, that's how you beat a goalie who is that good. You know, I know maybe the Igor chance got to him.

Maybe, maybe not. But I think it was more of just a perfect shot there. Really nice job from Malkin to laid it in there in the right spot. And, of course, Raquel's screen jumping up, getting out of the way. Shasturken, no chance for him on that shot. Again, that is how you beat a goalie. That is that good. You have to get traffic in front of them.

You have to make his life a living hell. And that is what you saw with that goal. Same sort of thing with the penguin's next goal on the power plate. The second unit comes out. The first unit wasn't really doing much. And right after Brian Rust missed a pretty easy tap-in at the left of the net. Parks his butt right in front of the net. POJ has the puck at the point.

Wristed in, beautiful deflection. right in front, no chance for Sir Sturkin. Again, another way, you know, that's how you beat him. You get traffic in front and you get deflections to beat him because it makes his life even harder. That is where the game changed right there. And after that, Malkin goal and after that Rustle, the Penguins took it to the Rangers outside of a few shifts, I think, in the third period, especially those final

few minutes where the Rangers were really pushing. I thought the Penguins mostly outplayed them for the second half of the game. And that's all it can take. Mike Sullivan even said as such, after the game was saying, like, we didn't have our legs in the first half of the game. We weren't playing well. No, we weren't getting any quality chances. I even tweeted after the first period that I could count the number of quality chances on one hand, heck, maybe on one finger, because they had that chance, what, 10, 15 seconds into the first period with Raquel.

And then, you know, Crider was able to get that really lucky balance past Trist and Jari to make it 1-0. the penguins were finally able to wake up in the second period. So, you know, everything, you know, was able to come together for the penguins to win this game in the second period. Special teams do you matter, you know, the power play, it has been great. I know with Ronnie. Ronnie, come on, buddy. Come on, buddy.

I don't know why you keep whining at the door. I know. It's okay. We're recording the show here. So you're in the show again, as you always like to be because you're a total nut. Anyways, you know, power play, which, you know, has been an albatross for a lot. of this year, stepped up to the plate yet again, nine straight games now with a power play goal for the penguins.

This unit, both units, I should say, continue to be awesome. Flat out, awesome. You know, the Rangers penalty kill, that's a good unit. They came into this game, what was it, sixth in the NHL in terms of penalty kill percentage, and the penguins, they made quick work of them, say the least, I'm going to keep you right here, so you can stop whining in the background. The listeners don't want to hear that. But, you know, just a beautiful,

and I mean a beautiful power play goal to tie the game, Ross was able to make it 2-1. And then in the third period, the good play continued when Jake Gensel and Cindy Crosby continued to terrorize the Rangers. Remember, in the playoffs, they had no answer to that duo, and you saw that again.

Poor Jacob Trouva back there. Doesn't know how to defend a two-on-one, It doesn't know how to do a lot of things, I think, at the NHL level. But, you know, Gensel made quick work of him, delivered a nice pass. Crosby was able to go forehand, backhand, five hole on Shasturkin to make it 3-1. And that ended up being the game winner because Choirs scored just a couple of minutes later. And the Penguins were able to withstand a few barrages from the Rangers in the third period. But, you know, again, I will say this.

That game changed in the second period. period, and I will say it again, very similar to what happened in game five of that series back in May. Remember, Penguins up 2-0 halfway through, you know, I know it sort of helps that Cindy Crosby got knocked out of the game, but still, the Rangers, they suddenly flipped a switch after they got that goal from Adam Fox, and, you know, it snowball. 2-1, 2-2, 3-2, and Penguins tie. But then the Rangers get that goal early in the third to make it 4-3 to extend the series. you know, that is all it can take to, you know, change a game and change the result.

Because honestly, Yins, Penguins were lucky they weren't down two or three nothing at the midway point of this game. Tristan Jari was saving their butts. They were not skating, but after they got that power play, and after Raquel honestly delivered that big hit because he continues to be awesome right now, it all changed and the Penguins were able to skate away with the wins. So that was my key moment from this game. And I think the big, the just biggest moment from the, this game was that Malkin goal to really tie up the game, get the Penguins back into it because

it snowballed from there and the Penguins delivered a very good effort for the most part over the last 30 minutes. So that wraps up this first segment of the episode. Coming up in the second segment, we're going to get into Tristan Jari's performance and why he continues to play very, very well because he, again, he saved them in that game. But before we get to that, a wonderful BetOnline promo for you all there. Beneline is your number one source for sports betting info, stats, and use an analysis. You can get the latest odds and trends for every professional amateur league out there from pro football to college full season to basketball in the World Cup. We've got it all at Benonline.com. If you love sports podcast, you can even find those at But Online as well.

We're always the fastest and easiest way to get your betting info. You head to the website today or use mobile device to learn more. That is, but Online, where the game starts. All right, I'm back on this episode of the Lockdown Penguins podcast. I'm your host, Hunter Hodes. me on Twitter at Hunter Hodes follow this show. He's Twitter at LRSwerpang. And, of course, thank you all so much for making this your first listen of the day. So, Chris and Jari, as expected, got the start in the game last night. And wow, was he good? He was ridiculously good all game long.

I know had a little bit of that bad bounce. If I can find, you know, not the Rangers goalies, that's the Penguins goalies stats here on MoneyPunk. You know, I know, let in a bad goal. You know what? I shouldn't even call that a bad goal. It was a bad bounce. Excuse me. I saw some people blaming Tristan for that goal.

I completely disagree with those people. I just, you know, it's a bad bounce. You know, Criter shoots the puck, goes off Pedersen stick. Tristan can't track it as well. It's in the back of the net. Okay, bad bounces happen. As Pat Damp said of KDCA, and he obviously hosts the Dying Alive podcast with Jesse Marshall and Mike.

darnay, you know, he even tweeted, I wish the penguins would get that balance once in a while. And I'm like, Pat, are you new here? I think you are new here because the penguins, they never, ever get that kind of balance. It was crappy. You know what? You play on, and the penguins, they were able to do just that, especially Tristan Jari. He was awesome in this one, 59 minutes at 5E5. Expected goals against two, actual goals against two.

Goals had above expected 0.005. So he played as you expected him to. And now he is continuing to really buff up those stats. 11 and 0 in his last 13 starts, 935, 940 percentage. He has been electric for this team over the last stretch. And I understand that maybe you wanted to keep the backup fresh against the Carolina Hurricanes. You want to get him some starts. Okay.

It's maybe the only reason I can see why he got the start. But, you know, Tristan Jari is this team's number one goal tender right now. He has been that good for at least the last month of the season. And honestly, I think most of the struggles early on that you saw came down to special teams and Tristan Jari not being healthy. You know, he even said as such, you know, remember back, you know, towards, what was it? Early to mid-November, he even said that he was playing through an injury. definitely doesn't look like it right now. He's playing like one of the best goaltenders in hockey.

The second goal, just a really nice shot from Chris Kreider. I know POJ kind of got walked by Vince Troj trick there. Maybe his mom his grandma's chicken parmesan when he had the whole team over on Monday night. But, you know, Dari had no chance on that one and no chance on the first one. I think other than that, he made some exquisite saves for the penguins to really keep them within striking distance throughout the rest of the first period. and the second period, because remember, especially in the first, because the Penguins, they got out to that 6-1 lead in shots, right? But after that, the Rangers really poured it on.

And to be fair, I don't know the Penguins had a 6-1 edge in shots. None of those were good chances. The Rangers had the puck the entire time. They were just were not getting the chances on net after the credit rule. But, you know, after about the halfway point in the first period, you know, they had, what, six of the last seven shots to end the period? Second period, they were getting, they were out shooting the Penguins, what, six, seven nothing. if my memory serves me right,

but Tristan was standing tall and was playing at a very high level. And that is a glimpse. I hate to bring this up. That is a glimpse at what it could have been for the Penguins against the Rangers back in May. I'm not saying what happened. I'm just saying it's a glimpse of what it could have been

because when he plays like that, that is how the Penguins can go deep in the playoffs. They need the goal ten. You know, they don't just want it. They don't just, you know, have to, you know, they don't just, you know, oh, it'll be good if they have it. No, like, they need that level of goaltending. If they are to make the playoffs and win a round or two rounds or three or especially go to win a four Stanley Cup in the Sydney Crosby, beginning, Malkin era, they truly do need that level.

And you saw him at that on Tuesday night, a tremendous performance in the Penguins number one goaltender. Right now, he is playing like someone who deserves a long-term. contract. I'm not saying that he's going to get it, but right now he is playing at the level that, you know, I could definitely see Ron Hextall saying, like, hey, you know what, that's enough for me. I'm going to pay him right now. I don't think he's going to do that right now. I think he's still going to wait, but probably going to keep negotiating and stuff, see how he plays for the rest of the season, especially in the playoffs. But right now, he's playing like the way he played last year. No, he's not top 10 in goals state above expected or anything like that, but he has the same percentage

over the last month. He has the wins. He is on a hot streak right now, and I'm really excited about it. He'll start, I think, on Thursday against the Carolina Hurricanes, and then they'll have that five-day break, obviously for the holidays, well, for Christmas, I should say.

And then I think, because they have the back-to-back next week, you'll probably see Tristan go against the Islanders, and I think against the Red Wings, we'll probably see Casey to Smith go, and then that Friday game right before New Year's Eve, I think you'll see Tristan go for that one too. You know, they are, you know, he is playing at a very high level,

and I can credit him a lot for this win against the New York Ranger. So I really wanted to spend this segment talking about Tristan because he truly was magnificent in this game. So that will do it for the second segment of the episode. And coming up in the final segment, we're going to get into the no call that was not made at the end of regulation. we're going to get into, you know, so much other stuff from this game overall and just what it means going forward and why I think this team still needs another third line center. So stick around for that coming up in this final segment. All right, I am back here on this episode of the Locked on Penguins podcast.

I am your host, Honch Hodesmer to follow me on Twitter at Hunter Hodes. I'm just, and again, I apologize for my dog's whining. He's not usually this bad, but I think he's just, you know, He probably sees some doggies out there, and he is very jealous about it. Right back into it. Yes, I did change locations because Thrawn or Little T, as I like to call him, he was just being too much at the door. I apologize if you were hearing a little bit of that one.

I will try to cut it out in some of the editing. So let's get into the rest of the big events that happened in this game. And yes, let's get into what happened at the end of the game. So Penguins are defending a 6 on 5. Everything is looking good. they're actually not doing a bad job of it. And then Mika Zabinajad comes in, one of the fastest skaters, not only just on the Rangers, but in the league,

blows past Brian Newman. Dumlin obviously trips him. And then Wes McCollally is just standing there, looking right at the play and is deciding, you know what, I'm going to go back to my hotel a little bit early tonight. And, oh, you know, you all know that it only was going to take that for Rangers fans to get pissy. Sure enough, Twitter became a,

war zone between the two fan bases because of that play. And here is my message about that play. Was it a penalty? Absolutely. Dumblin got away with one there. It should have been a six on four. Would it have mattered? Probably not because the Rangers were over-through on that power play in this game.

The Penguins penalty kill was taking their lunch every single time. It looked like a complete 180 from the playoff series. Do I feel sorry for them? No. I mean, I can say this right now. you know, does that fan base not recognize that they got bailed out in the third period of game seven when Alexei Lafremier literally ripped off Marcus Pedersen's helmet and they didn't call a penalty, which led directly to meek his advantage at time the game with 545 to go when the Penguins have the 3-2 lead.

Sorry for me. There was also a headshot at Sidney Crosby. There was, they literally won the game or the series, I should say, on the power play in game seven. There is no sympathy for me and there should be no sympathy from any of you all. I don't want to hear about blaming the refs. An inchal officiating is a sham. It always has been, you know, maybe as, you know, one of my friends said to me, maybe you shouldn't go 50 plus minutes without scoring a goal.

Maybe you shouldn't go overthrew on the power play. And maybe you shouldn't let the penguins get back in the game by taking a really stupid penalty. I'm looking at you, Kandre Miller, with some retaliation to record Raquel. They didn't do those things. They maybe would have skated out there with their eighth win in a row in another win against the penguins. But nope, that's not happened. The ping was able to take advantage of it. Again, it was a penalty on Brian Dumlin, West McCauley, not a good ref.

There's no weird conspiracy. There's no, just because it's in Pittsburgh or any of that garbage. It's just, that's NHL refing. You know, you could literally look at countless games during NHL seasons. So people just watch other games other than their own team and see that this happens on a weekly basis. I don't know if it happens on a nightly basis, but it happens on a weekly basis. That is NHL officiating. It gets worse every season.

Rangers were, you know, they didn't get it last night. You know, but I've seen that happen to the Penguins as well. It hasn't been called. We've all gone upset, but there's no conspiracy. There's no rigged or anything like that. It's just, you know,

NHL fish shitting is a sham. So I wanted to spend a few minutes on that. Again, after what happened, a couple of calls in just the series as overall, they don't get any simple thing for me. You know, it's a regular season game. You know, the Twitter, the timeline,

won't turn into a war zone for three more months since these teams don't play again until March. That doesn't really make a difference to me. But just what a great game this was overall to watch. You look at the overall numbers. The Rangers had the edge in Corsi. They had the edge in scoring chances. The Penguins, though, had the edge in high danger chances

and expected goals. Penguins actually had 57.26% of the expected goals at 5v5. And they had 60% of the high danger chances. The Rangers, though, 57% of those. scoring chances and 54% of the shot attempts at 5-8-5. Then if you go to all situations, the Rangers had 60% of the shot attempts, 60% of the squain chances, Penguins, though, 52% of the high-danger chances, and then expected goals, it was a true 50-50.

And there's that, but 5-5, the Penguins were the better team with the expected goals and high-danger chances. I think overall, you know, other players that really jumped out to me in this one, I talked about where Cardo Calve that hit, but, man, he just continues to be electric for the penguins this season. I can't say enough good things about him. Ryan Russ, he had a little bit of redemption. He looked like he wanted to go after Ryan Lindgren.

I don't know why Lindgren was just cross-checking people left and right in this game. But, you know, Russ wanted to go after him so bad. And Kisbury Kappen was like, nope, you're not going to do that. You just scored. You don't take a penalty. Go to the bench. We just got the lead with 12 seconds left. We're going to go into the intermission with it.

And sure enough, you know, they were able to do that. He restrained him. Jason Zucker had a hilarious answer about this after the game. I'm actually going to pull this up for Yen's right now. Danny Shari of DK. Pittsburgh Sports asked him about Rust almost going after him. And he said, the guy has fought his pillow about seven times in his career and that's about it. So I don't think he was going to do anything. Just a beautiful answer there from Zucker.

And man, Zucker has been awesome this season. and was week to week, comes back after two games, and you can just see how much better the team is when he's in the lineup. I know some people like to joke around about his injuries, and I get it. He hasn't been healthy for a lot of his penguins tenure, but he makes a difference. You can see it out there with his play in his defensive zone,

with his forechecking tenacity. I think he's arguably their best forechecker forward-wise. And just, you know, the way the lines, you know, mesh well with himself next to Malkin and Rust. It is so evident how much he means to this team. Do not take that for granted Penguin's fans. He has been awesome this season, and you saw it again on Tuesday night against the New York Rangers,

making sure I got everyone else that I wanted to hit on. I thought Chris Lattang, another very strong performance from him. He continued to play. He continues to play at a very high level coming off that stroke. I don't know if it was like migraines before the show. stroke affecting him a little bit more with his play, but, you know, ever since, you know, he came back from that obviously very scary situation. He has played at a hundred and wins. I think that's mostly what I wanted to hit on for this game. I think moving forward,

you know, you look at the forward lines as a whole, you know, the Zulker, 72% of the, 58% of the shot attempts, Gensel-Korosby-Rekal-1% of the expected goals, 50% of the shot attempts, and then Hinen and Blugher paling 100% all around. But then you get to the third round, but then you get to the third line and I will keep beating this drum. This team is very good. One out of nine, 13, 16, there are two points behind the New Jersey Devils all of a sudden because the Devils was lost six in a row and it turns out that you do not win the Stanley Cup in November. It's almost like that little run was maybe just a mirage for that team. But the third line continues to be a major problem for the Penguins. That is the only the only negative that I will take out of this game.

The McGinn-Carter Capitan line. When they were on the ice, the Penguins only had 15% of the expected goals and 25% of the shot attempts. That is gross. And that's not good enough. Brock, he has played at a good level this season. I think Caponin has been playing a lot better as of late.

But the common denominator, of course, has been Carter. He has not been good for most of this season, and he continues to drag down whoever is on that line. And you can put whoever you want on there. I don't care if it's Dant Hinen. I don't care if it's because Perry Kaepin. I don't care if you want to move Teddy Bluger to wing. Somehow that's not going to happen, but just using it as an example.

It ain't going to change as long as Carter is the third line center. I truly do think this team needs another third line center to really contend in the Eastern Conference this season. If they are able to get that at the deadline by some divine miracle, just because I know what their salary cap situation is, I think they will have one of, if not the best forward groups in the league. it's just that is the black hole line right now Carter's not doing enough to help his line mates

and you know every time the penguins you know have that line out there they're just defending and you know another example of how bad that line is remember the third period last night a three on one with Carter leading the charge they don't even get a good shot on goal for that it's just it's not good enough yet so

I really I don't mean to end the show on a bad note there but you know it's just that's my main negative that I have. Not just about that game, but about, you know, just the season as a whole, you know, with that line. But overall, very gutsy win from the Penguins. Was it ugly? Yes. Is Mike Sullivan maybe fully happy about it? No. Do they need to play a full 60? Yes. Do they need to play better first periods, especially, to play the full 60? Yes. It's an obvious question that I just answered, but, you know, whatever. But a very big win for them. They take the two points. They're now in third place in the metro, and they have another massive showdown against the red hot Carolina hurricanes on Thursday, PVG.

I will be there for that one. Really excited to get back up home. I should say it feels where I call it home now to head to the game. If you all are going, let me know. Love to meet up with some more of you all. But that will do it for this one. But one more thing, my heartfelt thoughts and condolences go out to Franco Harris and his entire family. I was stunned when I saw the news about his parents in this month.

morning at the age of 72. I got very lucky that I got to talk to him just nine days ago about the 50th anniversary of the Immaculate Reception for my full-time job since I work at this one. Do not seem to have any health problems seem to be in great spirit. So I am very stunned by the still admit. And again, my heartfelt thoughts and condolences to go out to Franco Harris. He always seemed like he was larger than life, a true icon, not just in the city of Pittsburgh, but in the football world as a whole. And, you know, they were getting ready to honor this weekend against the Las Vegas Raiders for the play. I'm going to be at that game as well.

It's just going to feel a lot different now. But just wanted to end the show on that note. But again, thank you all so much for listening. Really do appreciate it. I will be back on Thursday with the full Penguins Hurricanes preview with Jared Ellis of Lawton Canes. And then I will recap that game for you all on Friday. So a lot to look forward to this week for the Lockdown Penguins podcast.

Keep it right here. Subscribe on YouTube. You can listen to Apple and Spotify and ad free on Amazon music. Well, teams playing really well. No better time to keep listening to the show.