Locked On Penguins - Daily Podcast On The Pittsburgh Penguins - Breaking down the Penguins winning streak with Jesse Marshall!

Episode Date: December 2, 2024

The Pittsburgh Penguins are on their first three-game winning streak of the season and we break it all down on an all-new Marshall Monday! Hunter and Patrick are joined by Jesse Marshall for another Marshall Monday for the first segment and together, they look at the Penguins three wins over the Vancouver Canucks, Boston Bruins, and Calgary Flames! Jesse dives into the goaltending and how he's not ready to say both goalies are back after this week. After that, he dives into Owen Pickering and how he has his stamp of approval to stay up with the main team before Hunter and Patrick discuss Sidney Crosby's great week and the power play being red hot. Finally, they look at another big week ahead with matchups against bonafide playoff teams.Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!PrizePicksDownload the app or go to https://prizepicks.onelink.me/LME0/LOCKEDONNHL to get $50 instantly after you play your first $5 lineup. GametimeDownload the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDONNHL for $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply. Download Gametime today. What time is it? Gametime.FanDuelYou can start the season with a big return on FanDuel. New customers can place a FIVE DOLLAR bet and you’ll get started with ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY DOLLARS in BONUS BETS - if you win your first FIVE DOLLAR BET ! Visit FANDUEL.COM to get started. FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN) Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

The Pittsburgh Penguins had their best week of the season this past week by winning three games in a row, and we're going to discuss that on this edition of Marshall Monday. You're Locked-on Penguins, your daily podcast on the Pittsburgh Penguins, part of the Locked-on Podcast Network, your team every day. Hello and welcome back to another episode of the Locked-on Penguins podcast. I am one of your host, Hunter Hodes. You can follow me on Twitter at Hunter Hodes, joined by my host Patrick Damp. We can follow him on all social media platforms at Syndrome for Wet.

And you can follow these shows, Twitter, at L.O. underscore Penguins. And joining us once again for Marshall Monday is Jesse Marshall of the athletic Jesse. Thank you so much for coming on again. We both really appreciate it. And of course, we are free and available on all of your podcast platforms, including YouTube. And one more thing today's episode is brought to you by GameTime, down the GameTime app, grant account and use code locked on NHL for $20. off your first purchase. So guys, Pittsburgh Pengland just had their best week of the season this past

week. They not only beat the Vancouver Canucks, they go up to Boston to beat the Bruins, which is a very rare feat for them considering that's been a kind of their house of horrors up at TV Garden. And then the next night after, they absolutely kick the pants out of the Calgary Flames at home at PBG Paints Arena. And I said it on Twitter this week. This was a great week for this team. The stars were awesome. The depth scoring was there, especially Philip Tomasino, we'll get to him in just a second. Carlson and Lattang were exceptional this week. And last but not least, they got great goaltending from both Tristan Jari and Alex Ndolkevich. And I kind of want to start there, Jesse. Tristan Jari, I felt enjoyed the best week of his season to date. He was really good against

the Canucks outside of that. Second goal, Pat and I disagreed a little bit on that one, but I still felt like he could have that. But then in Boston, I even said it on Twitter, I'll say it again here. I got to give credit where it's due. He was exceptional in that game, made a lot of really big key saves, especially on that six on five at the end of that game. That was the Tris and Jari that we saw a couple of years ago when he was playing the best hockey of his career for this penguin's team. So it was nice seeing that come out at least a little bit. And then the next night, you have Alex Nadelkovich, easily his best start of this season.

He flout out robs, Rasmus Anderson in that game. That save kind of reminded me of Florian Eric Carlson when Carlson was in Ottawa when he lunged the glove over to basically rob him from the goal. really nice game from him. But one of the biggest reasons why the Penguins won all three games this week, excuse me, was the goaltending. Yeah, and I think not filling their diaper defensively. Yeah.

I think that's really like helping the goaltending out to some probably extent. You know, the thing is, is that it buys no trust from me. And that's going to sound like cruel and, you know, callous. But there has to be like a gross level of consistency. that probably for me extends to like a month at that position before I start to like hoot and holler about it. But it's encouraging, right? There's one of two things that probably could have happened or maybe a secret third thing that we're experiencing right now. But, you know, the point I'm trying to make is Tristan Jari going to the American Hockey League, right?

Like that could have been disastrous. And like we've seen goaltenders melt from getting that assignment and never really, recover from it, mentally. So it's good that we're in this position, right? I mean, that's what I'll say. It's good that, I mean, whether you like the contractor, you don't. I know most people don't, and there are a few, if any, that do. You have to tolerate it for now because that's who's here.

So you have to hope that the best works out. Not only, you know, for the performance, but if Kyle Dubas's interest is unloading contracts, he's no longer a fan of, it's hard to do that with a goal tournament that's not playing well. you know, maybe you get lucky somewhere and you can strike while the iron's hot on a trade, you know, given, you know, certain parameters. But if Jari's playing well or is sustainable in his performance, that's a lot easier of a thing to do. So it's dual benefit in that sense. You hope it continues. But overall, I think, like, they're making life ultimately a little bit easier on themselves by not having these diabolical meltdowns that just lead the three-on-one's. or 2-0s or whatever the case may be. Yeah, it was a very encouraging three games from that sense.

And you kind of hit on that, Jesse, was that the defense, especially the play in the defensive zone was a lot more structured. They were where they needed to be. They didn't completely melt down like we talked about a couple weeks ago when teams just simply reversed to the puck. And then they turned into might league players. They actually got to the spots they needed to get to. they helped insulate their goaltenders.

And you looked, especially I said this about the Vancouver game, it was very, yeah, everyone looked at the shot totals early on and went, wow, they're getting caved in, but it was Carolina Corsi hockey. They were keeping them to the outside. They were letting their goaltenders see it. So that was a very encouraging sign to me. However, what I wanted to talk about with you, because I wanted to run this one by you.

And I'm going to preface by saying this, I'm not making a one-to-one comparison. I'm not saying everybody should get their hopes up. But Philip Tomasino, I look at his game. I see a little bit of Jake Gensel in it because you look at his two goals. He was able to kind of sneak away from the defense, make himself get lost, and then he pops up again, and what do you know, he scores. So very small sample size for him since he was just acquired about a week ago,

What have you seen out of his game, Jesse? Yeah, I like what I've seen, to be perfectly frank with you. I think that whether you want to judge his performance vis-a-vis the I test, which has been good, or the end result analytics, which have also been good, I think coming out of Calgary, I think he had, if you look at just forwards, I think he had the third highest game score from that game. And I'm saying just looking at forwards because, like, Eric Carlson was won by, like, a margin, like a significant margin. But I think if you look at Vancouver, you get like a similar result.

And it's not, you know, what's funny is that the game score impact-wise, it's not all offense, right? Like he's making, again, we saw I posted a video on Twitter of him being the only player in a group of five to not, to not sink below the goal line to try to defend the play and get into the slot and break up something that wasn't really something he should have done but did because he recognized the threat, which I thought was great. So it's both, right? You get like, obviously the offense has been there so far for him, but the defense has been, I think, fine.

And I don't, I haven't, you know, Nashville is not a team I followed, you know, super closely this year to know exactly what it was that was dogging him out of the lineup up there. But, you know, I mean, they're having, like, closed-door player-only meetings about heart and effort in Nashville. So it sounds to me like the situation up there is not super bueno right now. And I don't know that they really had a defined role for him. This is a good defined role. Like where they have him right now is I think this is what his ceiling is, if you want to be honest. Like this is this, a run of this nature would be what I would consider to be his ceiling.

So to see him come over and sort of immediately assume the responsibilities with those level of minutes was super positive. And it's not all even strength either, right? Guys, that's the other thing too. Like you're seeing him in a variety of situations. No, I agree. And I love that you posted that clip on Twitter because in real time, he was probably, we just like, hey, what are you all doing? Because I said this to Pat before we started recording.

I believe he's one of the five smartest players on this team already with just how out to lun some of these other players are defensively. Because when you posted that, yeah, four players behind the goal line, Tomasino's like, uh, what are you all doing? Like, you know the fuck's going to come to this spot. Sure enough, he's in the perfect spot at the perfect time. He's able to get that puck out, just a really great defensive play. And even both of his goals, he's able to deke swimming out of his socks a little bit.

That was nice. and then he gets the other goal from the side about, what was it, five, 10 feet out, basically. That was really nice. So it's been nice seeing him just play really good situational hockey, really good in all three zones, if I'm being honest with you. Another thing I wanted to talk about, Jesse, is the play of Blake Lazott. I feel like that's gone a little under the radar this year. Yes, he hasn't been that healthy.

He's had multiple concussions, but this feels like at least a little bit of a different team when he's in the lineup. four goals in 10 games though as pat pointed out to me before we start recording and we have it in our notes he's shooting 30% this season that is going to come down totally sustainable yeah totally sustainable very small but i really like his play he's good on the penalty kill he's good at even strength and when he's scoring you know things are obviously going real well well excuse me for the penguins but i just really like the fit that he is in the lineup right now yeah well i mean he's exactly is advertised, right? I mean, if you read the reports, the scouting reports on him before he came

over and sort of like the bill of goods that we were being sold on who he was as a player, it's very accurate. And there's a nice little bundle of, I don't want to call it untapped, but there's a nice little bundle of skill in there. You know, there's energy, which is great. And I think, like, the vibe he brings to a line is obviously very up-tempo and high-paced. But if you find him in a little one-off, like, battle situations one-on-one, he's able to win a lot of Pucks with deception, skill, bank passes off the wall to himself, right, outthinking somebody or outsmarting them and finding a way around a forecheck that way. So I think it's, you know, he's found ways consistently to elongate offensive zone possessions

or actually I would say even just create them himself with how well they can chase it down. So I think like, you know, Mike Stevens, one of my friends from North coined the term cardio merchant to describe players that Kyle Dubus likes to pick up. But like, you know, I think in both of the players we've just discussed, that's true, but there's also this added element of like, again, not, not, you know, like game breaking skill, but enough skill to keep a play alive, enough skill to get another scoring chance. And with the minutes we're talking about, I mean, I really, that's all you can ask for, I think.

So, yeah, it's, he's, you know, you talk about players. with pulses, like discernible pulses, even in the bad times this team has had, you know, Lizotte's name is on the list for sure. Yeah, and you definitely, I think, have been, I've been beating this drum for a while. They've missed kind of that Patrick Hornquist kind of player that when this team's in the doldrums of the season, they're going to go out and just have a ridiculous high energy shift that kind of wakes everybody up and makes them go, okay, well, you know what, if he's doing it, we got to join him. We can't leave him out on an island. And I think Lazotte's a guy who can certainly provide that as well as a Brandon Tanna flag.

Yep, exactly. Guys who just they may not score a bunch of goals and a pile of points, but they're at the very least going to set a sort of a culture and a standard for your team that you need away from all the high skill guys. Last thing for me, Jesse, Hunter and I were kind of discussing this briefly before you got on. The play of the last week or so from both Chris Latang and Eric Carlson has vastly improved. And I think a lot of it, at least in my estimation, and Latang and Carlson both kind of hinted at it in post game pressers, is that they've just kind of simplified. They haven't tried to do too much. They haven't been trying to create all on their own. They're using the players and situations around

to their advantage, but maybe I'm just getting caught in with all of the post-game cliches. Is at least that what you're seeing? Oh, yeah. Yeah, plain as day. Yeah, not like egregious pinching on like 40% chance puck's, right? These are talent. These guys are still talented at their age, right? Like, they're still good hockey skill inherently in there.

When they don't beat themselves, they're fine, right? And the numbers that they're going to put up may not be otherworldly. Carlson may not hit 100 points again. You know, Latang may not be in some of the conversations he was in, you know, five, six years ago or seven years ago. But they still give you a plus 50% performance in almost all buckets when they're just fine, when they don't try to do too much to your point, Pat. And I think we've got to give an honorable mention here to Owen Pickering, who I don't know that I would have described as ready necessarily, but like has been deceptibly proving me wrong.

I don't know if I, it's one of those things where it was like he felt like kind of of a quad A player, right, that was like maybe too good for the American Hockey League, but also not necessarily good enough for the NHL yet. But I think I'm wrong. I think that now is the time to like do what you can to let that, let the minutes rack up for him a little bit too and see how it goes. But yeah, overall, like I said, that's the critical piece to this whole Winstreet guys, really.

It really is. It's like, and it starts with Letang and Carlson because I hate to say this, but like one of the two of them is on the ice almost all the time. Really, look at the percentage of ice time in a game and tell me when they're not out there at even strength. It's few and far between. So when they're making those mistakes, you know, I don't want to sit here and put the blame on just one player because it's how everyone reacts. But they create a lot of bad environments sometimes, right? And it doesn't cancel out the good environments that they do create and they constantly do, right?

They constantly are giving you zone exits and shock quality and all this stuff. But at the same time, like it's marred between these periods of two. just like ugly grossness defensively, that's always born of a place of trying to create more, right? And I don't, you know, again, I'm not sure that that's been necessary to create more part specifically. And they've done pretty well with what they've had over the course of the last week. So hopefully that's a trend, right?

Hopefully you see that continue. And things have gone well for both of them during this period of time. It's not as if their games have regressed. It's gotten better, right? If things have gotten better with a little less on the fork to choose. So, yeah. good shout pat i agree with you and i think that's that's spot on yeah i felt like ever since that shot block by letang in the game against the bruins he's been all worldly since then he was great

against the flames and i've been fairly critical of him this year and i hate saying that because he's been one of my favorite players for a very long time but it just felt like to me that his skating was kind of stuck in the mud he wasn't making the right decisions he was out to lunch defensively wasn't giving them enough offense but then you get to these last two to three games this has been by far the best stretch of his season today. And then Carlson as well. I sent out to the Vancouver game to pack. I want to see more consistency from him with his game. Well, you've gotten that, especially against Boston, especially against Calgary. His gap control has been better. He hasn't been out to lunch in the defensive zone. He's been giving them more offense. This is the Eric Carlson I want to see on a more

consistent basis. And just real quick, Jesse, before we let you go, would you keep Owen pickering up for the rest of the year? You know, the reason I'm answering this question with yes, Hunter, is because the AHL video of him is just so uninspiring, right? Like, it's, it's, I don't know what you'd ask him to do. Like, what is it that you want him to work on? You know, I don't know, is this, I don't think his foot speed is going to improve down there, right? Like, I think it'll improve from having to play against Nikita Kucharov every once in a while. Like, that'll do it, you know what I mean?

But I don't think going down and, you know, playing in the American Hockey League is going to help. I think the ship has sailed, and this is okay, by the way, I'm not, don't take this as a complaint. I think the ship has sailed on him becoming, like, this Justin Schultz kind of player, which is what people fancied him as when he first got drafted. Like, that's, I don't think that's happening. I think you're getting, like, a guy, like a Brian Dumlin, who's a little less apt to handle the puck grenade-like. You know, Dumlin, I don't think he was really very comfortable carrying the puck around. So I, you know, my answer is yes because I've watched him play in the American Hockey League this year and I don't see anything else down there for him, right?

And as I told you guys the last time we met, it's really hard to put a highlight tape of him together in the American Hockey League because it's him just like poke checking puck off people. And like, yeah, that's good, but nobody wants to watch that for five minutes on a mixtape. You know what I mean? Like that gets boring after a couple minutes. It's like that's what he's doing, though. Like he's just, I think defensively there's nothing more for him down there. And I think the type of player that he's evolving into, even if you're playing him as the number six guy, like remember, think back to Dumlin and his trajectory guys. And think about how that first year and a half went for him, right?

It was like gross. And there was a question at time, like, and that's for that Rangers series was like sort of when he matured and blossomed, you know. The point I'm trying to make is that the ice time was valuable to Brian Dumlin, right? Like there was a rust that needed to be shaken off. There was sort of like a priming that needed to happen before it all clicked. I would just give Pickering that time now. I would just give it to him now because, again, I don't think you're going to gain anything from him going back down. His skating is not going to get better.

I think these are meaningful minutes for him no matter what level they're coming at with a second pairing, third pairing. I've seen enough to bang the gavel and say that I'm ready to see more. Yeah, I know. They've been kind of easing him in, giving him third pairing minutes. he's been playing a little bit with Ryan Shea. I'm kind of at the point where maybe you throw him out there with Letang for a few games and see how he maybe swims with him there. I mean, I would want to see it over Grizzlik at this point just because I don't think

Grizzlick has had a good season. But still, I would at least want to see that a little bit as well. But that'll do it for this first segment of today's episode. Coming up in the second segment, Pat and I are going to get into Cindy Crosby's play from this last week, including two disgusting passes from him to record Raquel and a look at the week ahead as well. But first, we got to tell you all about our first sponsor, and that is Fandul. Get ready to tackle the NFL action with Fandul.

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Download game time today. What time is it? It's game time. All right, are back here in this episode of the Locked-on Penguins podcast. I'm one of your host, Hunter Hodes. Join him on my co-st, Patrick,

and we want to thank Jesse for coming on for that very long first segment. That's going to be the theme of Marshall Mondays going for. We're going to have him on for one segment, about 15 to 20 minutes each just because of his schedule. So we're really looking forward to, it going forward as well. But Pat, getting into some other aspects of this great week for the Penguins,

Cindy Crosby was once again sensational. He gets the primary assist on the time goal in Boston, that sexy pass for Ricke. Let's call it what it is, Pat. That was sexy. Times running out. He gets that pass to Raquel right in that prime high danger area. Raquel makes no mistake. They tie it up.

And then late in that game against the flames, he absolutely cooks that Flames defender along the boards. Follow follows that up with a gorgeous pass to Raquel, who makes no mistake with that. The captain is firing on all cylinders right now. Those two passes, I could watch a hundred more times and I wouldn't get tired of it. Really nice week from Cindy Crosby once again. Looked very much kind of what I was referring to where it felt like as he was in the lead up to his 600th goal, he was kind of in his own head knowing that he was knocking on the door of history, wasn't kind of looking like himself, but now that that's out of the way,

he looks like he's back to be in Sidney Crosby once again. We also can't go without mentioning that the developed, the already developed and now more developing chemistry between him and Ricard Raquel is a very encouraging sign. Regardless of what Kyle Dubus decides to do with Ricard Raquel moving forward, you know, you could kind of tell that there was, a little bit of a brief period there after Gensel got moved that Sid kind of went into a little

bit of a shell because he didn't have the Robin to his Batman. And the way Raquel has been playing, especially since being moved to Crosby's line, is a very encouraging sign because we have seen now, especially with all the years of tape that we have from when Jake Gensel was here, you put somebody who can finish and go to the scoring areas on his line. Crosby is going to find them. And if that player finishes, it's only going to get better and be more of a productive relationship. So I have been, especially this past week, extremely encouraged by both of their plays.

Agreed. And another thing I really wanted to shout out during this episode, the Penguins Power Play has been red hot these last few games. The puck movement has been very crisp. They're getting the high danger areas. They're finishing those chances. They're not really giving up too much of anything short-handed. And the power play is right now 23%.

That's a little bit above average. That's 12th in the NHL right now. Much better compared to last year. That was one of the worst powerplay units in the league. Pat, what have you been noticing this last week, especially when it comes to power play? Because it was on fire against the flames. It was honestly, I felt okay against the Bruins,

good against the Canucks. But it's just been really nice to see it. above average at least right now. They really only had one opportunity against Boston. The other was a shortened power play. I don't know why I blanked on the word shortened. So they didn't get a ton there. But then against the flames.

And it was all the second unit. And if I'm the top unit, I'm studying the tape of what the second unit did. And it was exactly what you and I spoke about in the preseason, in the lead up to the year. They didn't do anything flashy. They worked the puck to places where they could get a good chance, whether it was up top or on the side walls,

and they kept moving. They kept their feet moving. When this power play struggles, they all go to their assigned spot. They stop. They play paddy cake with the puck. And the penalty kill just kind of lets them run the clock out. Against the flames,

they were moving the puck. They were moving bodies. They were taking shots when they were there, and they were willing to go to the front of the net. They keep this up. They can stay right there in that 7 to 14-ish range in the national hockey league. They don't have to be the best power play in the world. We're not going to complain if they are, but at the end of the day, if they can stay in this range and it can be a difference maker for them, again, I still believe that this team is going to stay on its same trajectory where they're, going to be either a full seller or a half seller come the deadline.

But we know that this team still has plenty of talent on the roster. There's a lot of meh, but near the top of the roster, there's still a lot of talent. And if you can have a power play that is a threat to other teams, teams are going to adjust the way they play against you. And that can make the difference between winning a game. in losing a game. So really encouraged by what I saw the last week, they just have to, more than anything,

keep it simple. And I'll keep it real when it comes to Matt Grisick a little bit more. I've crushed him all up this year, especially at five on five. He was good on the power play this week. I thought he was very fluid with the movement on that second unit. That was encouraging. So I will give him his flowers for that right there.

And last but not least, before we get to the week ahead and the Penguins will play some really good teams this week as well. I know this season has been hell on earth for basically everyone, but it's been really nice seeing them play good hockey this past week. I hope this week put a smile on everyone's faces and just brought some good vibes to everyone. Because Lord knows, we've really gone after this team on the show a lot this season

because it's been deserved. They've been one of the worst teams in the league. But I'm just glad that the stars were good, the depth was there, the goaltending was very good, and they were very watchable. They played with a semblance of structure, which has been missing in virtually every game this season. They weren't too aggressive.

They toned down some of those pinches that Jesse was talking about. Their gap control was good. Their third periods were mostly very good this week. Everything was really encouraging. Now, granted, people, are the Penguins back? No, we're not going to have the Peter Griffin meme that says, hello, we're back department. I'd like to file a claim.

We're not there. Let's see how they play these next several weeks before I bust out that meme for everyone. But at the very least, they play good hockey, and that's what I'm here for. Yeah, just be competitive. I don't, I don't care if they, because we know what this roster is. This is not a great roster. It's, it's average at best, it's below average at worst.

If they just play good competitive hockey and they lose a game three to two, four to three, two to one, whatever, but it's a valiant effort and they, look like they're a competent hockey team. Where this team wants to go right now, that's more than enough for me. Right. I just want to see that effort on a nightly basis. I want to see that this team fully cares on a nightly basis. You saw that this week in particular, and the Penguins will have another golden

opportunity to beat up on, well, I shouldn't say beat up. They have a golden opportunity to beat some more quality teams this week. And Pat and I are going to discuss that a little bit coming up here in the final segment. But before we get to that, we have to tell you all about our last sponsor and that is prize picks. It's the best place to get real money sports action and with over 10 million members and billions of dollars in awarded winnings. Price picks has made daily fantasy sports accessible to all. You just pick more or less on at least two players for a shot to win up to a hundred times your cash, run your game all season long on prize picks. You can out went to

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Again, down the app today and use code locked on NHL to get $50 instantly after you play your first $5 lineup. That's prize picks. Run your game. All right, we're back here in this episode of the Lockdown Penguins podcast. I'm one of your host, Hunter Hodes, join my co-s Patrick Gam. So, Pat, three more big games for the Penguins this week. We thought last week was going to be tough and they passed that test. Well, this week I think it's going to get even tougher because starting on Tuesday,

the Penguins will host the defending Stanley Cup champions in the Florida. Panthers. The Panthers, I think right now, best team in the conference, they are playing exceptionally good hockey. I have them as the favorite to come out of the Eastern Conference right now. Yes, I know the Capitals are playing very good hockey. Yeah, the Rangers, Rangers, excuse me, are still lurking, but they're also playing really poorly. Right now, you have the Devils, you have the Maple East, but the Panthers right now, to me, are the best team in the conference. That's going to be a big test for the Penguins at home on Tuesday. And then on Friday, a trip to Madison Square Garden and take on the New York Rangers. And as I just said,

man, who they're struggling right now. I know they just beat the Canadians, but they kind of got a little bit lucky to do that. You've seen Chris Drury say, hey, I'm kind of open for business right now. I have Jacob Truba on the market. He's been kind of on the market, though, for the last several months. You have Chris Quider, apparently, on the market. And it's like, hey, Chris Jury, if you want to trade Chris Criter out of the division, please do it.

I don't need to see him kill the Penguins every time these two teams play. That's going to be a big game on Friday. And then on Saturday, Caldubus' former team, the Toronto Maple East come to Pittsburgh. for another back to back for the Penguins. So three big games this week pack against bona fide either playoff teams or Stanley Cup contenders. I would say the Panthers again, very much a contender. The Leaves, at least a bona fide playoff team. I'm still not ready to say they're a contender yet just because they haven't gotten it done to the playoffs.

And then the Rangers, at least a bona fide playoff team right now, I would think, though, they still got to play a bit better as a whole. So again, very big week, though. It's huge. And you know what you're going to get out of the Florida Panthers. you're going to go through 60 minutes of hell. They are going to beat you up. The whistles aren't the end of the game against the Florida Panthers.

They're going to goad you into scrums. They're going to try to get you to take penalties. They're going to do everything to get you off your game. And they can score and they play good defense. It is a genuinely great team. They did not win the Stanley Cup by accident. This was not a team that got hot at the right time. This was just a very, very good hockey team.

So this will be a massive test for the penguins. You can't take the bait against the Florida Panthers. Let them take their pot shots. And hope that this streak of solid power play, play continues because you can make them pay because they will take penalties. They're not afraid to take penalties. So that's huge for them. Rangers, that's a pride game, man. They embarrassed you on your home opener, on your own ice.

and yeah, they're struggling right now, but again, Metro Division rival, former Atlantic Division rival, former Patrick Division rival, you name it. These teams have been rivals forever. So that's a game that can go either way. In Toronto, I mean, I'm with you on, I'll call them a contender once they finally do it, but in the regular season, they're always one of the better teams. They know how to score.

They've seemed to at least somewhat learn how to defend, and they're getting competent goal tending for once. So these are three games where we're going to find out, was last week an aberration or is there something brewing on this penguin's roster? You took the words right out of my mouth there, my friend. It was last week a mirage, which I'm leaning towards right now until we see how they play this week, or is this to start of them really building some momentum?

Because right now they are still very much behind the eight ball. I mean, they played a whole bunch more games compared to some of the other teams in their division. They're still outside of the final playoff spot. So they really need to keep banking points if they want to somehow find their way back into this race right now. And yeah, you said it about the Panthers. That is 60 minutes of hell.

They play like rats. They're the type of player who, if you like video games and you go up against someone who you hate playing against, that is the four Panthers to a T. They play like rats. And they're going to make you pay for, everything on the ice.

It's going to be a lot of fun. The Rangers, yeah, that's a big pride game. And maybe you can go out there and try to embarrass them at the Guard of the Penguins. They played awful against them earlier in the season. But maybe you're catching the Rangers at a good time right now with the way they've been struggling. I mean, some of their star players haven't been playing well. But they're still going to have Shisterc in a net for that game.

And we all know he's arguably the best goal tender on a planet. And historically, man, penguins play pretty well at Madison's, Square Gardens. They're not afraid to go to MSG. They're not afraid to go to Broadway. And when they do, they play pretty well. So with the Rangers kind of in a bit of a slump and a funk right now, you go up to Madison Square Garden. And yeah, maybe the Rangers figure it out over the next few months. But if you can push them just a little bit closer to the edge, especially after what they did to you in your home opener, that's at least a little feather in your cap. Agreed. And we'll get to that game a little bit later on this week when we get to the preview for that game. But I think that will do it for today's episode of the Locked on Penguins podcast. Thank you all so much for taking the time to listen to slash watch this one. I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving holiday in the United States. And the Penguins brought you some good vibes, especially after the holiday.

But Pat and I will be back for another episode of you all on Tuesday to get you all set for Penguins Panthers. And then we'll recap that game for you all Wednesday. And also discuss the Four Nations faceoff rosters. Those are dropping this week. will get you all up to speed on which penguins will be on those teams. But for Patrick Damp, I'm Hunter Hodes. Thank you all so much for tuning in. We appreciate it.

We'll be back on Tuesday.