Locked On Penguins - Daily Podcast On The Pittsburgh Penguins - Oh we have A LOT to talk about when it comes to the Pittsburgh Penguins...

Episode Date: November 1, 2022

Oh, things are bad, folks. Hunter is back to recap the full Penguins collapse against the Boston Bruins as they again couldn't hold a third-period lead. He starts with the goaltending as Tristan Jarry had perhaps the worst game of his season. He goes into how he needed to make a save for the team, especially during the overtime session after the Penguins failed to score on the power play. He also looks at how sluggish he's been the last few games and how he's not playing as aggressively as he should be. After that, he looks at some poor personnel decisions in the late stages of the third period, including putting Brian Dumoulin out there for a 6-on-5. What should the Penguins do about him? Will they do anything? Hunter tries his best to answer those questions before he rambles on about how there's too much "dead weight" in this lineup right now. After that, he takes some listener takeaways before doing a small preview for Wednesday night's game against the Buffalo Sabres. 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!SimpliSafeWith Fast Protect™️ Technology, exclusively from SimpliSafe, 24/7 monitoring agents capture evidence to accurately verify a threat for faster police response. There’s No Safe Like SimpliSafe. Visit SimpliSafe.com/LockedOnNHL to learn more. 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.

Man, things just go from bad to worse, I think at this point. What's up, everyone? Hunter Hodes here back with another episode of the Lockdown Penguins podcast. For tonight's episode, we're going to dive into everything that went right, and mostly everything that went wrong, and the Penguins 6 to 5 heartbreaking loss to the Boston ruins, and overtime they get a point. But losing streak has now reached five games.

So we're going to dive into all of that game, look into some of the problems that have persisted throughout, this losing streak, and especially from a previous couple of games on the road trip and how the penguins, you know, I got to figure out a way to get this back going in the other direction against Buffalo on Wednesday. I'm going to preview that game on this episode as well. Just a whole lot to get to for this one. So hope you all join me 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, everyone, and welcome back to another episode of the Lockdown Penguins podcast. I'm your host, Honor Hodes.

You want to follow me on Twitter at Honor Hodes, follow the shows, Twitter at at L.O. underscore Penguins. And yeah, I think that is the best way to describe tonight's loss. And I will do it again for you all. Ugh. That is, it's a yikes. Like does the kids say,

Dogwater. Yikes in the chat, L plus whatever these people want to say. It's lost. You're up 5-2 with 25 minutes left. You blow that lead. You're up 5'3. If 9 minutes left and a 30,

you're up 5-4 with a buck 30 left. And you can't finish it off. And you get a power play in overtime. And that leads to some goals against. And I think it's only right that we start this episode with the goaltending. Because, you know, I think that's been, honestly, the big sticking out point for me.

During the Zoo streak, or one of the big sticking out points for me, the goaltending has just been atrocious. I mean, Casey DeSmith, we'll play fine, but Tristan Jari, these last three to four games, not on his game. He honestly could allow him seven goals tonight, to be honest with you. I mean, he got bailed out by the Mike Sullivan Challenge. And usually this team, you know, not super good with goaltender interference. I think last year they were below 500.

But for this one, you know, they were able to win that. And, you know, the Penguins, that kept the game five two before the Brumans made a five to three just a few minutes later. But again, overall, it's not good enough for Trish and Jarring. So 28 shots against night at 5B5. This was at 5E5. So three goals against at 5B5. Expected goals against 2.290.

Say percentage 893 is actual goals against, though, 3.62. he got out three high danger goals against 5.71, same percentage. That is not good enough. And the sixth goal that he allowed, the overtime winner, excuse me, to Lindholm, that was probably the worst of the night, to be honest with Jans. I mean, I don't know what in the heck Tristan was doing on that shot. You know, just put your glove up, man. I think that's really all you had to do in that situation.

That's a shot that comes 30, 35 feet out. I don't think he was screened. I mean, I've watched that replay about three years. four times now. Looks like he had a clear line of sight of it. Just for some reason could not make a save there. You've got to bail your team out in that situation. I know the team just screwed up and they didn't score on the power play and a couple of other awman rushes.

But when you need to make a save for your team, especially after you gave up five goals, you got to make a save there. And I'm not really going to blame the fifth one or the fourth one on him just because the fourth one, that's a really nice deflection by Zaka, the Beggings, there's nothing they could do there. They were dominating the third period up until that point, at least in my opinion, and you can look at the score effects as well. Fifth goal, that's just bad in zone D coverage for some reason. Brian Dumlin is out there. I'm going to get to that a little bit in just a second. But, you know,

a couple of the other goals, just not in position. He's standing way further back in his squeeze. That was one of the biggest things I noticed tonight, honestly, guys, was he was not playing aggressive like he normally is. And when he's not doing that, he looks rowled he just he looks small in his net and that is exactly what you saw for this game against the ribbon just did not have it at all and you know it's hard for me to criticize him just because i was so high on him coming into this season i said he was going to be a vestin trophy finalist he was probably going to be top five goal save above expected start off the season red hot looking like he was going to get an extension and then you know the last few before games

he's just falling off he's not even close to being top ten and goal sales above expected for this, for this season. So it's something that he's going to have to figure out pretty quick. Luckily, again, guys, it's November 1st, you know, teams, they go through rough patches like this all the time of the beginning of season. Heck, you know, Colorado's not even off to a good start this year. I think Minnesota's off to a rough start. Washington's not playing well, but they're also pretty banged up.

But goaltending, not good enough tonight. And I think that's been a little bit of a story over these last four to five games, they have the penguins when they need a save from one of their goaltenders, they have not gotten one. Special teams, I thought they stung tonight too. PK, same old kind of issues. But the power play, especially in overtime, you have a four-on-three for full two minutes.

You have three of the best players in the league out there. I know no Chris Lattang obviously hurts, but you're telling me you really can't get a lot of sustained zone time for that. I mean, like the zone entries I thought were Putrid. They got a couple of chances, but the puck movement wasn't that good. I mean, I know Jeff Petrie, you have to have a defenseman on there. They're not going to go forward forwards. I mean, he's not, Mike Sullivan's not going to galaxy brain himself there.

But still, like, usually when I watch other four on three power plays, you know, the puck movement looks crisp, you know, the other team is hardly getting the puck for the entirety of those two minutes. But the Bruins, they have the puck quite a bit. And, you know, it's something that, you know, Tom Rood, and really needs to fix. I think the power play looked good coming out of the gate this year, since then, total dog crap.

And I think going into that game against Vancouver, Seattle, ever since that hard start, they had like a 16 to 17% conversion rate, which is a little bit below average. It's just not a good enough unit right now, and I think they need to take a long look in the mirror for that. But, you know, those are my two main culprits of this game. obviously Brian Dumlin being on the ice for that time goal.

I don't know what Mike Sullivan is seeing there. I really do not understand why he is playing high leverage minutes when you are trying to win a game. You are on a four-game losing streak. Why are you trying to ice a, why are you icing a player that has been bad for this season? I understand the guy as a veteran. He has played well for you for the back-to-back cup teams. I get it.

He was great. But you know what? The last two years, he stung. I don't know how much more clear I got to be on this. He was washed last year. I gave that a pass. I was like, you know what? Maybe he turns around this year.

So far through 10 games, he looks bad. I mean, and tonight, he was without his primary partner in Chris LaTang. Even next to LaTang just has not been good. And again, I just, I don't understand the logic there. You can go put out Jan Ruta if you want. just honestly put out Pedersen Ruta there. Done, easy.

Two guys who are good in front of the net. Jim 1 is not going to win those net battles. Yes, the payments need to be better with clearing the net front or just getting the puck out of the zone. In those situations, it was the same similar thing to what happened in Montreal, but you also got to protect your goalie and they were not doing that in that six on five,

especially June 1. He's not been good enough. And at this point, I really don't know what you do with him. It's obvious of the coaching staff. doesn't see him as a problem yet. Mike Sullivan said after the game that, oh, I thought he competed hard. Yes, that came from Danny Shiree.

He's currently getting ratioed from, you know, his tweets. But, you know, that's not his fault. He's just relaying the news here, people. But again, it's obvious, and that's annoying, but it is obvious that the team does not give a crap about his performance right now, and they think he's chugging along fine. I don't know, man.

if you're asking me, not good enough. Tonight, I mean, led with Corsi, 64%. Expected goals, a little over 50 scoring chances, fine. But, you know, the eye test just woof, to say the least. And last but not least, I'll say this. You don't a four game losing stake. Hold the lead. You got to come out of there with that win.

I understand the Bruins are really good. They're probably a lot better. They're probably better than I thought they would be. this season, but that's just not good enough. It's unacceptable to lose that game. And now you're seeing a lot of reactions from people, and some people are right about this team. I think some people are a bit foolish.

I mean, I keep hearing the same argument that, oh, well, it's the same team coming back. And it's just like, I mean, yeah, no crap. It was the same team coming back. They got screwed on goaltending last year and they outplay the Rangers for that entire series. Of course, they weren't going to make you many changes. They didn't need to make.

make that many changes to this team. I keep seeing people blaming the core players for some reason. I'm sorry. Both Sidney Cronhampton scored tonight and Chris Lentan did not play. And yeah, he's been kind of mad to start the season, but I'm not going to really place the blame on them for the, like place the full blame on them for the 5B losing street. It is a team effort here, people. At the end of the day, that is what it is.

Some of the debt players are also not stepping up. The defense hasn't been good enough and the goaltending has been good enough. and, dare I say it, Mike Sullivan has also not been good enough as Penguins head coach. I don't usually criticize him that much because you all know how I feel about him, but he has not been playing some of this best matchups in high leverage situations, like the Duman situation. Heck, the fourth line was on the ice with three minutes to go, and they got hemmed in, which led to the David Posternerchance.

Why? Why is that line that Brockman, again, Ryan Paling, and Josh Archibald, seeing ice time with three minutes to go when the Penguins are up one? That is not the line I would be. throwing out there that is for sure so yeah i mean i think that's like the main negatives from this game that i really wanted to touch on um coming up in the second segment we're going to get into um just you know why there are too many passengers on this team right now especially depth forward wise and we're also going to get into at least i'll get i'll touch on some of the positives

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This is their biggest discount at the year, so don't wait. That is Simplysafe.com slash Lockton NHL NHL. There is no safe like Simply Safe. All right, I'm back in this episode of the Lockdown Penguins podcast. I am your host, Honour Hodes. We're going to follow me on Twitter at Honorable Hodes. You're going to follow the shows Twitter at Eleanor Penguins. And of course, thank you all so much for listening to this episode of the Locked on Penguins podcast.

All right. Also another big issue from what I've been seeing these last few games. And I apologize for no episode of Monday for Halloween. But too many passengers, I think. Look at the bottom six. Even with Jason Zucker and Jake Genselback. And I know Jeff Carter is out right now. And Teddy Blugher has not made his return yet, but I think his return is coming in the coming days. But even Carter honestly has been a passenger for most of this year. But hey, guys, you know, big Jeff Carter scores goals sometimes and all that stuff. But, you know, you look at the underlying numbers, his defensive metrics are putrid. And honestly, he's just been falling off a cliff ever since he signed that deal. But again, hey, you know, he sometimes scores an occasional goal. Brock McGinn has been invisible for this entire season. That contract is looking really bad right now. And, you know, everyone that's listened to this show for over a year, if you haven't,

You can go check on my episode with Rock. I think he's a really nice guy. It was great to have him on. I thought he was going to bring a lot of oomph to the team. It's going to be a great brand of Tanna replacement so far. Just hasn't been the case. I just don't notice him whenever he is on the ice. And he's eating up precious cap space right now,

$2.75 million to the exact, to basically just be a guy. That is what he is doing on the ice, every single shift out there. He's just gliding. He had a couple of swore chances tonight that he usually, Barry's that he just didn't defensively. He's been bad. Penalty kill, not good enough. And, you know, this is year two of year four of that contract. Josh Archibald, nice goal tonight.

I will say that. Good job for him. It was a bounce back from him. Overall, though, when you look back at the previous four games, he's a player that was just putting them shorthanded almost every game. And it's like, you know, you're obviously hurting your team when you're doing that. And also, you're not really doing anything else outside of that. Again, I understand. Better game from him tonight. It's what I wanted to see. But overall, just hasn't done enough this year in the bottom six.

Ryan Paling, some people kind of went after me just because I roasted him a little bit after the Vancouver or Seattle game. But still, I think at this point, you know, for a player that was basically a throw-in to the Petrie trade, I mean, that's what you're seeing right now. I really don't think he has that much potential. Maybe he'll prove me wrong. I'm just, I'm not a big fan of him at this point. That's my opinion, though. Nice to see you, Drew O'Connor, at least come in the lineup tonight. I think they'll obviously want more of him if he's going to stay up,

even pass one Carter or Blue Goor return or something like that. But again, like there's just, there's too many passengers in the forward group. And heck, even Jeff Petrie, I think he's. he hasn't been that good to start the season. And if his offense doesn't really come back, the Penguins could be really screwed with the rest of his contract. But, you know, I said coming into the season, they need more from their bottom six and they have not been getting it.

Because, very captain, I thought he did have a solid start to the season. But, you know, lately, the third line continues to be a very big issue. if you go down and look at hockey stat cards for tonight. No, Pedersen, Peterson, Petrae, struggled a little bit, but the entire third line, Heine and O'Connor Capitan, three of the worst forwards on the ice. They were all in the negative score for how they played. I mean, especially for Capitin, he's been invisible

these last four to five games. Honestly, what has he done? Me last four to five games, except just glide around as well. the game was one to one against Seattle with a minute and a half left. In the second period, the Penguins, you know, they had won a couple of challenges. They've cracked and a couple of goal back. But, you know, Capitan's coming up the ice.

You want to see him use his speed to his advantage. But he just throws a blind pass into the middle of the ice. It's picked off. Seattle goes the other way. They make it two to one. That's your game. And as the Penguins don't score in the third period. And tonight, he didn't make that kind of an egregious turnover.

But also, again, it's just it's not good. enough from him, especially because they just gave him two years and 3.2 million per season. I mean, Dan Hinen, I don't really have too much to criticize about him because I think he's been really good to start this season. But, you know, overall, that third line of those three, no, that hasn't been good. I mean, it's only a one game sample. But even when Carter is there, hasn't been that good either. I think the bottom six is a major issue for this team right now. I definitely still think that they need another C. I think Bluger is a fine fourth line center.

I don't think he's going to be someone that ever goes up to a third line center, but they need another guy who can play at both ends of the rink, who also has a good goal scoring touch and also whose numbers are not just putrid. And you know, Carter at this point, again, played great in the first half of last season, signed his contract, looked bad after that. So far the season before, even before he got hurt, not good enough either. So I hate using this term, too. I just feel like there's a lot of dead weight on this team right now.

And I'm not saying this. It's not like Craig Adams, Joe Battallies, Exil, any of those players from the late ratio days. But still, you know, those players are better than those players, but they're still playing like dead weight. And that's not good enough when you are in a win now mode. So really wanted to touch on all of that. You know, it was great to see Jake Gensel have a great game. Sidney Crosby was flying. everywhere of Guinea Malkin thought he played well to Ricard Raquel he's i think been their best

player this year i have no problem saying that if you guys want to disagree with me you can i think he's been the only player to show up in every single game this year um what more can you say great is great has a wonderful release great first pass defensively he hasn't hurt them at all been a natural fit on crosbie's line i've really enjoyed watching him play so I'll definitely not criticize him. Those players, again, thought they played pretty well. I thought Marcus Pedersen had a fine game, Jan Ruta, fine. But sooner the team needs to start getting out some wins.

I know they're four. How do I want to say this? I know Yen's five-game losing streaks aren't fun. It's not fun for me to sit here like this and, you know, be sad for you all. But, you know, I got to call it out. I do this for you guys, and I try to be as objective as I can when it comes to this team. Honestly, you take away some of the goaltending,

the Penguins, they control 58% of the shot attempts at 5B5. They controlled 50% of the scoring chances, 65% of the high danger chances, and 61% of the expected goals. 95% of the time, the team that controls all that wins that game. And the Penguins, honestly, people aren't going to want to hear this, but they were playing a great third period before that Popplzaka goal. They were shutting the Bruins down.

They were back checking hard. They weren't turtling. I saw that term thrown around tonight. I do not believe they were tortling. Even after that, the Bruins had a couple of chances. The Penguins had some really nice bounce-back shifts. They just didn't do enough in those final couple of minutes to just really keep the puck on their stick

and find that final goal to secure the win. And the Penguins, they're going to have to learn how to defend leads in the third period. This is the second time already in 10 games that they have won a lead in a 6-on-5 situation, 20% so far. has to change if they want to go anywhere this year. So that does it for this episode, this segment of the podcast. Coming up in the final study, we're going to get into some listener takeaways and do a small preview for the next game against the Buffalo Sabres.

So stick around for that coming up right after these messages. All right. I'm back on this episode of the Locked on Penguins podcast. I'm your host, Honour Hodes. You're going to follow me on Twitter at Hunter Hodes. You also follow the shows Twitter at AlnerSorp, Hanglons. course, thank you so much for making this your first listen of the day. So a couple of other, a couple of reactions here.

Nick says special teams are a miss. Dumo was cooked and Jari was really bad. Yeah, I mean, the special teams just haven't been good enough to start the season. Jari again, making me look bad for sure. And yeah, yeah, right now, Dumoin definitely does look a little cooked. Tom Petroni says at some point you need to wonder if the players have tuned out Mike Selvin. This is a team that's worse than all facets so far. Honestly, Tom, I don't think they've tuned out, Sully.

I think they're just having, they just kind of, since this is going to sound so cliche and stupid, maybe. They need to figure out how to win again. And it sounds dumb, right? They start all the season four and no and one. But when you've lost five in a row, you know, you make losing plays. Like, when you've lost that many games in a row, you're not making winning plays. So they need to get back to that.

Just get down to basics, you know, quick. passes, defending hard in front of the net, they getting saves, all this stuff. Once, you know, I think they get really get down to basics, this team should be fine. We have seen this team be on another level this season. They didn't start out four and no and one for no reason. I truly do think this team is good. This is a 100 point team. They're just going really going through it right now and they've just lost the will to win, I think. I don't think it's anything to do with Mike Sullivan. I think, you know, all the players play hard for him, but it's also something that, you know, they got to stop making losing plays. That I think is the difference at the end of the day.

Jackson Hollister said, you know, this team has so many good players and they just can't get it done. I know it's a good Bruins team, but come on, they blew a three-go-le-le-lebe. We're watching two completely different teams from the first four games to now. Yeah, I mean, that's what I'm saying, Jackson. Like, I know there's a good team in there, and I understand that they sometimes start the season's a bit slow, but, you know, they just got to start making winning plays. Once that comes around, this team's going to go on a winning streak. I truly think that.

Yes, King Clarkie, I know you're doing your Connor Vodd tweets just for the tank. It's always hilarious from you. And, yeah, overreacting a bit. Yeah, I mean, they pissed away this game, special teams, net front defense. I wouldn't say they have no gas left in the tanks. I just think, you know, one team made winning plays. The other team continues to not make winning plays at this point. Wesley, I disagree.

with you that the penguins played bad in the third period. Up until the eight, the 12 minute mark, the penguins were keeping the puck away from the ruins. I don't, I do legitimately do not even remember a schooling chance that they had in the first 12 minutes of that third period before that harmless wrist shot came in from the point and Zaka was able to tip it. And that's just awesome defense, by the way, from Jan Ruja. There is, there is absolutely nothing that Ruta can do there.

He's playing that perfectly. It's just a really nice deflection. And yeah, you would like Charlie. to make a save there, but I'm not really blaming them. So honestly, I think the third period was mostly fine. You know, they can't give up a goal in the six on five, obviously. They've got to work on that. But other than that, I think it was an okay period.

And I think performance-wise, they play well enough to win. They just made too many dumb plays. Basically, finally, from, if I can find this one here, Alan to Yoder. Yeah, I know, Alan, I'm sorry you have. had to be that game. I know obviously it was wild. And yeah, the first power play unit. I'm honestly, might just be at this point now where I agree with you. And it's just like they should start the second unit out there at times. It's, they got to fix some things with that unit for sure. And yeah, Sid was awesome tonight as well. So again, I really appreciate all of you

sending in, oh, your reaction is funny enough. If you all are looking for a new phone case, this one just came in today for me. If you want to go to Red Zone cases, they're custom made, has Sid and Gino on the back of it. That's pretty awesome. Finally, real quick here before we wrap up, next game of the Penguins against the Buffalo Sabres,

a Sabres team that, you know, honestly, I'll say this. They've been pretty easy to share. Rasmus-Dalene is finally playing like a number one overall pick. He's been lights out for them. you know he has 12 points in nine games tage thompson literally just came off a six point night the other night and you know i think this is i wouldn't say this is like a mirage at this point they're six and three to the first nine games i don't expect them to make the playoffs this year

but it is good to see that team finally playing well this is definitely not a gimmee game for the penguins i mean there should be no game for them right now it's it's going to be tough for them to win especially on a back-to-back i would expect case he disn't to get the start um Jeff Skinner, always a good player. Again, Dahlene has been great. They got Owen Power. Cage Thompson, Casey Middlestadt, you know, et cetera, et cetera. So, you know, this is a team.

You can't take them lightly. You know, Alex Tuck, you know, he's out of good year, Peyton Krebs as well. So, you know, this is, they got to get a win here at some point. They're not going to lose every game the rest of the way here, but they got to get back in the win call. They should have had it tonight. Obviously, they had other ideas, but, you know, I think that will do it for this episode of the Locked on Penguins podcast.

I really appreciate all of you listening to this one, by the way, and I'll have another one for you all after the game on Wednesday. I'll have a fully recap episode for you all, and hopefully the Penguins will be able to come out with a win. So thank you all so much for listening. I will talk with you all on Wednesday.