Locked On Penguins - Daily Podcast On The Pittsburgh Penguins - Penguins couldn't comeback, drop a 3-2 thriller to the Blackhawks

Episode Date: November 10, 2021

Well, it wasn't meant to be as the Penguins dropped a thriller in this one to Chicago, 3-2. Hunter recaps the loss against Chicago and goes into what went wrong, especially during the first two periods. He also discusses the continued excellence of Tristan Jarry, despite how poor he's been in shootouts. What is driving that to be the case? He also gets into what's plaguing the power play as he begs the team to start taking better quality shots and have better puck movement. Other topics also discussed: How is Kris Letang continuing to get even better? Should Mike Matheson be demoted until Dumoulin comes back? Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!BetOnline AGThere is only 1 place that has you covered and 1 place we trust. Betonline.ag! Sign up today for a free account at betonline.ag and use that promocode: LOCKEDON for your 50% welcome bonus.Built BarBuilt Bar is a protein bar that tastes like a candy bar. Go to builtbar.com and use promo code “LOCKED15,” and you’ll get 15% off your next order.ShopifyGo to Shopify.com/lockedonnhl for a FREE fourteen-day trial and get full access to Shopify’s entire suite of features. 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.

Your Locked-on Penguins. Your daily podcast on the Pittsburgh Penguins. Part of the Locked-on Podcast Network. Your team every day. Hey everyone and welcome to this very late Tuesday evening episode of the Locked-on Penguins podcast. I'm your host, Hunter Hodes. Remember to follow me on Twitter at Hunter Hodes. Follow the show's Twitter at L.O.Ns for Penguins.

And thank you all for hopefully making this your first listen of Wednesday. We'll have another episode, obviously, bright and early. That day, you know, Pittsburgh Penguins do lose in a shootout to the Chicago Blackhawks Street of two. They are now four and three and four on the season. I guess, you know, my biggest takeaway from that game, to start at least. Really great third period. They just took it to Chicago that entire period. I believe they out shop them 20 to 5.

It was basically a power play for those entire 20 minutes. I guess after I saw them playing for the first few minutes, wasn't too surprised, but then on the other hand, I kind of was because I've seen these kind of games before from the Penguins where it looks like they're going to go the entire game without scoring because that's how it was going. Awesome pass from Jake Ensel to get Jeff Carter his first goal of the game, and then Carter was able to get another one with about four minutes left to basically, you know, steal the Penguins of point. I know Trishon Jari was also really good. We'll touch on him in a second, but that was just a huge period because Pittsburgh was

honestly playing like complete garbage, I would say, those first 40 minutes. Too many odd man, Russia is. They weren't getting a lot of zone time. Just getting bullied, I thought, by the Blackhawks, which is something that Chicago does not do much this season just because they've been so bad. The Penguins losing streak in Chicago will reach another year. They have not won a game at the United Center since 2009. I believe it was an Afghani Malkin overtime winner.

If I want to say, they've come close multiple times, but tonight, just were not able to do with the shootout. Look, I get it. It's very frustrating when they go to a shootout because usually this team used to be automatic with shootouts. You go back even just a few years ago when Murray and Fleury were there, and it would be like they would never lose one because both goalies were pretty good in shootouts. But Tristan Jari, for whatever reason, is just not good in shootouts. I mean, he's great in, you know, five-on-five penalty kill during the first, second and third periods.

he's awesome in overtimes. Then whenever the skills competition comes in, he just plays like crap. I really don't think I've seen a worst shootout goaltender in my life than Tristan Jani. He just like does not know what he's doing at all. I mean, the Taves one in I mean, comes in really quick. But closing the five home, man, I mean, the De Brinket won. That's just a nice shot. I don't really know how many goalies saved that.

But, you know, in the other one against Minnesota, you know, your team actually scores two out of the first three attempts. you need one save to win the game. I know Carrillo Caprisov's coming in. You're not able to do that. You have to make a save in that situation. A 300 save percentage in a shootout through the first few games. That is garbage and it is unacceptable. I'm sorry.

I know the shootouts go away in the playoffs, but you do have to get to the playoffs. I know half the league gets in. But right now, the Penguins are towards the bottom of the Metro despite being on a three-game point streak. Sooner later, you've got to start. stacking more points, though. I liked that they were able to come back in this one.

I'm not as mad as I was the other night because, you know, the Penguins should have won that game. It was honestly a joke that they did not win that, you know, just giving up a time goal with two seconds left. And then almost having it won in overtime. And then basically having a won in the shootout. And then your goalie gives up another one to keep the game going. If you would have had the save, they would have won it.

It's just an ugly feeling even tonight, you know, when they went into the shootout, it was just like, well, this is basically over. I was waiting for them to surprise me. It's just really frustrating to see how far this team has fallen with regards to shootouts. I thought the Latang and Gensel attempts were disgraceful, and I think the world of these two players,

I mean, I always praise them on this podcast, but I have to be objective. I really don't know what Jake is doing on that attempt. He's just coming in, shooting a glove side. He's not making flurry move. Do players know that they're allowed to make a deke on the goalie? I mean, Chris Lentang comes in. I understand he usually has his vaunted move, a forehand backhand.

I know Flurry, excuse me, has seen that multiple times in practice, but you know, you're just shooting at five-hole when he's expecting it as well. I mean, I just really don't know what he's doing it. What he's doing there, excuse me, while you just go backhand forehand or, you know, try another move or something like that, but, you know, they weren't making Flurry move. And yes, I understand he is the greatest shootout goal-tender of all time. Look at the accuracy with how many saves he's had two goals given. of, but they just did not test him at all.

One of my buddies actually texted me, and he said, you know, I would not have sent Latang and Gensel out there first because they practice with three, and he knows what they're going to do. I really don't think that's that bad of a take. I think maybe you do Casperi Capitan first. He usually comes in with a lot of speed, and he can rip at Top Cheese, you know, I think that definitely would have made a lot of sense, and then maybe you go to someone like Gensel or Latang.

I think Todd Reardon was doing it just because they're their two best players. Maybe you go out with a Jeff Carter, with a Brian Russ. I mean, I understand why he put Letang and Gensel out there, but I do understand the reasoning for maybe not having them start out there just because Flore has practiced against them so many times, especially with Tang. I thought the overtime was awesome. I love three on three. I can't get enough of it.

No idea how Patrick Kane did not score on that 2-0. Jari was playing pretty deep in his net there, which I think helped him because there wasn't a lot to shoot at. But, you know, was able to hit it off the post slash crossbar and they were able to at least, you know, at least, you know, take it to a shootout. I thought Brian Russ was able to win the game late in regulation. It looked like it was going to be a buzzer-beater, P.O. Joseph, wrist a shot in and out of Flurry's glove, juicy rebound,

and Russ just puts it high of the crossbar. If that goes in, I believe it counts because I think there would have been not even two seconds left on the clock. the Penguins, again, we're just probably an inch away from another win. I get it. You know, it's really frustrating at this team. Cannot win these games in overtime and the shootouts. I do like that they're continuing to at least bank some points along the way.

Hopefully they get some reinforcements back here sooner rather than later. I am sick and tired of watching this team with so many players out. I'm sick and tired of this outbreak with COVID-19. I did hear on the broadcast at Chatterweedo and Marcus Petter. and skated this morning so it looks like they're slowly coming out of COVID protocol. Hopefully, Sydney Crosby is coming soon after that. Just trust me, you know, I'm tired of it. I know you all are tired of it as well.

Hopefully when these four players come back, they can start banking some points. And, you know, that is going to be, you know, a point of emphasis that I'll touch on here before we end this first segment. You know, I know it's early. You know, I know they've played, what, 10, 11 games start the season. You still got 70 games left. It's early November. lot of time, you know, teams make their run

sometimes in January and February and go hot and make the playoffs. That said, the division is very tight right now. A lot of teams are getting points on an every night basis. I mean, New Jersey just crushed Florida tonight, which killed one of my bet picks on Fanswell. I don't really know what the hell I'm doing there.

Columbus is getting some points. The Rangers have started out decently hot. You know, flyers are banking a little bit of points. Pittsburgh has got to string some wins together here. I get it. The team is really banged up, you know, with injuries. a lot of with the COVID outbreak, but you've got to start getting the extra point here. You should have had it against Minnesota.

You could have had it tonight. It would have been nice to steal that point. Honestly, probably should have had at least a point against the flames. And you probably should have had the extra point against the Panthers too. You know, it's gotten fresh. I mean, you know, I know they beat the Flyers in overtime just the other night. But that also should have been a game one in regulation. You know, the end of the period tonight was definitely much better than what happened.

the previous two nights where they're giving up goals way too much at the end of the third period. I know I haven't talked to you all since last Friday, but that is another thing that has been really starting to piss me off lately is that the Penguins have been really bad at the end of third periods. They've just played so passive when the other team has an empty net or when they're about to pull their goalie, excuse me, it's just like you do realize it's a six on five for a reason

and that's very hard to score. There's 11 frickin' players out there. There should not be that many pucks getting to the front of the net. When you have a two-goal lead with less than four minutes to play, you should be able to win that game. That should literally be a 100% accuracy of winning. You should not be giving up two goals and not even four minutes when there's 11 freaking skaters on the ice. That's just unacceptable to me.

I know that game happened on Saturday, but I also haven't talked to you all since Friday. Overall tonight, I think the effort needs to be a lot better in the first and second. periods because I think obviously if the penguins play that way in the first and second period, like the way they did in the third, I think they come out of Chicago with the win and they break that little streak. But obviously, it wasn't meant to be the penguins dropped to four in three and four, and now they will welcome Patrick Hornquist in the, almost of the National Predators

and the Florida Panthers to Pittsburgh on Thursday, and they are writing a two-game losing streak right now as well. Still a lot more to get to on this episode of Lockdown Penguins, including, you know, Gisbury Capnin coming out, a couple of other players who I think have been playing well. But before we do that, though, does this sound familiar? You've got one device that lets you catch the game live, another that lets you stream your favorite shows, you're watching sports highlights on your phone, and you've got your neighbor's best friends login for the good stuff. Well, I want to tell you about a simple way to get all the entertainment you love without the hassle

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Content varies by package. All right, welcome back to this episode of the Lockdown Penguins podcast. I'm your host, Hunter Hodes. Follow me on Twitter at Honorhodeys. Follow this showdy's Twitter at L.O. Honexport. Penguins again, I apologize for not having an episode for you all. On Monday, I've started a new full-time sports writing gig with the Spun, which is Bore Sports Illustrated, and I was just gassed after that day.

It's something that, you know, it's an adjustment. You know, I have not done a lot of 40-hour weeks before. You know, I'm still a year out of college, but, you know, as I get more used to it, you know, I'll have a set schedule down with recording this podcast. Other stuff I noticed tonight, again, you know, this actually goes off of someone from Penguins' Twitter. Tristan Jari, 938, save percentage today, 9.30 during the season, excuse me, through 11 games. That's some of the best marks in the league.

I think he still has three goals saved above expected. He was one of the main reasons why they got a point tonight. Again, I'm not going to criticize him for how he's playing in regulation in the overtime, but the shootouts do have to be a lot better. I will shout out Chris Let's hang. Just what an effort from him in the overtime. The world really does not deserve. Tanger, that play, I believe, on the two-on-one.

I think Kane was breaking in. And they were leaving Kane all alone multiple times in the overtime. I'm like, you're just asking for one of the top five best players in the league to burn you. And he almost did about three to four times, was able to make this diving play as he was passing at. I believe it was due to Brinkett. And the Penguins were able to go the other way, I believe, on a two-on-one in their own to get a scoring chance. It's just like, you know, that's the kind of play that's just why Chris, let's see. Tang gets his money.

No other defensemen on this team is going to make that kind of play. You know, just his contributions to this team. They just continue to skyrocket game after game as he continues to do it all for this team. There was another weird instance at the end of overtime. I mean, I think Kane actually almost won it at the buzzer, just like Brian Rusted in regulation.

Matheson is clearly gassed, but is trying to go to his backhand with, I believe, what, eight, seven seconds? and then Chicago was able to steal the puck, get it to Kane, who fired a shot. It either went wide of Jari or he just got a little bit of it to make it go wide. I have to watch the replay. I'm not sure if it would have counted it looked like it would have, but I just don't know what Matheson is doing there.

There's less than 10 seconds left. You know, you look gas and just making a turnover for the sake of making a turnover. This is why so many people in this fan base are really sick and tired of Matheson at this point because he continues to make the really stupid play at the really stupid moments. It just doesn't make any sense to me. You know, this is who he is, though. You know, he's the total chaos player. I have said that time and time again on the Lockdown Penguins podcast,

if you have listened to this show, he's going to wow you at times offensively, and he is going to just make an egregious turnover that goes, what the hell are you doing? And that's exactly what he did towards the end of the overtime. I really did not understand what the heck he was doing there. Let's see other storylines that I have written down here on my notes. Okay, power play.

Garbage unit. They need more from this. And I tweeted this during the game as well. I will say this. I expected the power play to be bad at the start of the season just because, you know, no sitting in Crosby. Obviously, we expected to be back by now, but he has COVID-19. There's no of Yanni Malkin.

Chris Lattang had to miss some games due to COVID. Brian Rust had two as well. They haven't had that quintet out there that they're usually used to running, you know, which can take over games as it has in years past, right? But I also didn't expect it to be this bad out of the gate where the puck moving is just really slow. I don't like the shots that they're taking on the power play. A lot of them are coming from the point.

It kind of, you know, looks like the Islanders from the playoffs and from the regular season games last year, where all they do is rely on points. I think the Canadians were a bit of the same way in the playoffs in the regular season because, you know, they were just, you know, relying on deflections, excuse me, and stuff like that. I don't think the penguins are relying on a lot of deflections.

They're just taking low percentage shots where it's like, why aren't you going to the high danger areas and getting good scoring chances? You know, there's just no one, you know, in that slot area, there's no one really taking shots from, you know, the circles and all that. There's no one really just doing a good job parked in front of the net. It's just all these shots from the corner, from the point, from the goal line. Again, you know, the movement has not been good. I know it's tough when you have, you know, Rodriguez sometimes on your top power play and a couple other players.

But it's still a unit that needs to be better. You know, Reardon has been, you know, known for being a good power play coach. So that's why I think I'm really surprised as to why the unit has been pretty bad this year. Again, I understand they can't run that same quintet out there that they have in recent years. They're not healthy. But, you know, I think that's one of the reasons why the team has struggled to win some games in regulation. but not so much overtime because you don't really see a lot of power plays given to you an OT but you know more so regulation just because the penguins are not taking advantage of these

situations I believe they were up four or two in the game against Minnesota and they were given a power they were given a power play chance in that third and they were not able to take advantage just like that's a prime opportunity to put the game away but you still left the team in striking distance and look what happened you ended up losing a game in a shootout that you really had no business losing you know the underlying numbers were on your side and all that. So I definitely think that's a point of emphasis that the team needs to be better at moving forward. That said, overall, they've taken four out of six points these last three games.

That's very good, especially with all the injuries. Yes, it honestly should have been six out of six. Well, I think I should say this. I'll clarify. It should be five out of six at the least because they should have won that game against Minnesota. But I will still take four out of six points, especially with all the players in COVID protocol and all the injuries. But, you know, again, the time is now to bang points.

There's a lot of road games coming up after that eight-game homestand. They go to Washington this weekend, the day before my birthday. I believe they have the Western Canada trip coming up here really shortly. I believe that's actually in a couple weeks, if I'm not mistaken. That's obviously one of my favorite road trips. I love staying up late and watching the games. I know some people can't do it just because they have work the next day, and some people are a bunch of old farts.

But I absolutely love it. I'm a huge night owl, and I hope I, I hope I, I hope I see some of you all live tweeting the game as well. And, you know, Alan Ciotr, I'm actually glad that you tweeted this as I'm wrapping up this segment. He says, can you imagine if the Penguins Power Play was even a quarter as good as the penalty kill is? I know, man, if it were just a quarter as good as the PK is, they probably would have won one or two of these last games. I mean, it definitely is hard to watch. Again, as I just explained, Alan, the movement is terrible.

some of the zone entries I've not liked. They're taking very low percentage shots on the power play, which is just making it so easy for the opposition with the penalty killers just because they're able to just stand in front of the shots from the point, block it down, and then just clear the zone. It's happening basically every time the penguins are in the zone. I really can't count too many high danger chances off the top of my head these last couple of games. That is how bad it has been for this team this season.

So again, I thank you for bringing that up. We still have more to get to for this next episode, including a look ahead, some other players who I thought played well against the Blackhawks, plus a deep dive into the underlying numbers for what they told us about the game as well. First off, though, Bet Online is back and better than ever. They have a new web interface for the start of the basketball season, and that means more props, odds, and lines than ever before. Ben Online remains your number one spot for all the basketball and football action this season.

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I'm your host, Hunter Hodes. Remember to follow me on Twitter at Hunter. Hodees follow the show's Twitter at L.O underscore penguin. Some other players who I thought had a decent outing tonight. Brian Boyle, you can see that he's getting closer to scoring another goal for this team this season. I think he had one.

I want to say when the team was down two to one before Jeff Carter's second goal, a really nice chance from about, I think, 10, 12 feet out, Flurry was able to smother it with his trapper. I think he's been playing mainly well this season. I know I touched on this before the season started. As long as he's not Marching, Kowski, the signing is just, it's fine. Cindy Crosby is going to be back sooner rather than later.

Forward wise, they only have him in Malking out. So obviously both of them are going to come in when they're healthy. Who comes out now? I think Brian Boyle is probably going to have to be one of them. Who is the other player that comes out? Evan Rodriguez, is it going to be Drew O'Connor? I'm not sure. But, you know, they're going to have a tough decision to make once it is officially

ready to come out of COVID protocol. He has not started skating yet. I think he's been in the protocol for almost a week now, if I'm not mistaken. I believe it has to be 10 days at least for when he tested positive, though, I think for vaccine and players, since the team is fully vaccine. I think it'd be a bit different. I think if you have like two or three negative tests two to three days in a row, I think you can be out of protocol, but there's really been no update with said on that.

I thought P. P.O.J, he looked fine tonight. I thought he was skating with authority, playing good in the defensive zone. and was bringing some, you know, umph to the lineup with some good chances in the offensive zone. John Marino continues to be stellar on the back end. I like Tanton Hinen's game. I know he hasn't scored for the last couple of games, but you can see that I definitely think there's another one coming there.

I liked Drew O'Connor's game. He's also gone a little bit cold, but, you know, did you really expect him to score 82 goals and 82 games? No, I did not expect that at all. I don't think anyone did. But overall, I liked basically all the forward lines tonight. And here we go. This is the five-on-five play from Natural Stat Trek.

Penguins controlled 70% of the shot attempts tonight. They controlled 62.5 of the scoring chances. 70% of the high danger chances for, if I scroll over here, their expected goals for was 2.74 compared to 1.25 for the Chicago Blackhawks. Obviously, we all know what the actual goals for. The expected goals for percentage, 68.6% of the expected goals for. Just an awesome performance from the Penguins. I mean, most of that, though, was in the third period, though.

They were shoring to tilt the ice a little bit in the second towards the end. They had 64% of the shot attempts in that period. Scoring chance-wise, it was 9 to 8 in the second, but in the third, 14 to 3. So you can really tell that the Penguins decided to play a good final 20 to 25 minutes to actually secure a point. If you go to all situations here, they had 62.2% of the shot attempts, 55% of the scoring chances for. Remember, this is all situations. 62.5% of the high danger chances for, three expected goals for to compare to 2.39 for the Blackhawks

and 56% of the expected goals for overall. So all in all, I would say this was a better performance than I guess I thought it was because the eye test was not matching up to some of those underlying numbers, especially for most of the first 40 minutes. But, you know, again, this is a team. They played better than what their record indicates. Their top five, I believe, in expected goals for this year.

their top five in high danger chances for it's just really croppy luck when they're going up against a goalie that plays like God on some nights and you know they're just choking away leads late in regulation that's just really contributing to them to dropping games that they should not be dropping and giving away loser points that they should not be giving away as well so I think that's mainly just been the big culprits also before I end this episode I did want to touch on this so the lawsuit against the Pittsburgh Penguins with Jared Skalday and his wife They have reached a settlement. So what that basically means, I'm sure there's a lot of money that was involved. They seem to be satisfied with what happened. If you just read this statement, I guess they seem satisfied. But there's probably a whole lot of stuff that we don't know and that we probably will not find out about this situation. But it looks to be in the rearview mirror as of right now. So I wanted to update some of you all on that in case some of you did not see that happen on Tuesday morning.

Otherwise, that will do it for this episode of the Locked on Hangling's podcast. We'll have another episode for you all coming tomorrow, probably within about 12 to 13 hours time, just because it's so late right now as I'm recording this. So I'll talk to you all that.