Locked On Penguins - Daily Podcast On The Pittsburgh Penguins - The Penguins can thank Jeff Skinner for that win!

Episode Date: December 10, 2022

It was looking dicey at the end but thanks to Jeff Skinner's stupidity, the Penguins were able to win it in overtime thanks to a power play goal from Jeff Carter. Funny enough, that's where Hunter starts Friday's episode as he looks into what set Skinner off in the final minute of regulation. He goes into how Jake Guentzel made a normal play by going to the net and how Skinner took it way too far with that crosscheck. Will that lead to a big suspension? Does that kind of play need to leave hockey forever? Hunter answers those questions before complimenting the Penguins for not retaliating and sticking to Sullivan's philosophy of "just play" heading into overtime. After that, Hunter analyzes how the Penguins were able to tie the game early on in the third period thanks to Sidney Crosby's great play along the boards. He also praises Brock McGinn for continuing to stay hot and Tristan Jarry for keeping the team in it despite them not playing well for the first 40 or so minutes. He also analyzes what the PP is continuing to do well and how the PK was able to keep the Sabres off the scoresheet...for the most part. Finally, Hunter looks at some issues that the Penguins will need to clean up heading into Saturday's game and why the Dumoulin-Rutta pairing might need to be split up for good. 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.Athletic GreensTo make it easy, Athletic Greens is going to give you a FREE 1 year supply of immune-supporting Vitamin D AND 5 FREE travel packs with your first purchase. All you have to do is visit athleticgreens.com/NHLNETWORK Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hello, everyone. Happy Friday, December 9th. I'm Hunter Hodes, the host of Lockdown Penguins coming at you all with another episode as the Penguins continue with their winning ways, a 4-3-combra behind victory against the Buffalo Sabres. They are now 11 and 2 in their past 15 games. We're going to fully recap this game and look ahead to Saturday's game from what the Penguins can improve upon because there are things that can improve on. We'll get to Jeff Skinner's stupidity. That's actually going to lead off the first segment. We'll also get into a beginning Malkin's stupid penalty. Brock McGinn, staying hot, a really underrated play that was made by Cindy Crosby to get the tying goal to Rickel. Chrisanjari's performance, POJ, so much to talk about when it comes to this game. And it all starts right after this. 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 your host Hunter Hodes. You're going to follow me on Twitter at Hunter Hodes. Also follow the shows Twitter at Eleanor So Penguins. And of course, thank you all so much for making this your first listen of the day. Today's episode is bought to you by Ben Online. Bet online as you covered this season with more props on some lines than ever before.

That has been online where the game starts. Again, if you have not listened to a few episodes this week, I apologize for my voice right now. Yes, I am congested. I have the cold still. I actually am feeling a little bit better today. Funny enough, my nose is not as stuffy, but I'm fighting through it. You know, it's, I'm hoping my Monday that this is all just a mirage at this point. But yeah, just not, not, not, I'm not having a good time right now to say at least.

But, you know, we're going to power through this episode. We're going to hit on everything. And let's get into it right now. So, you know, the biggest moment from this game came late in the third period. Tide game. It's going to go to overtime. You're going to see some three-on-three action. Nope. Do not get to see that.

A puck comes into Craig Anderson. He's able to crowd with his glove. Gensel comes in, gives his pat a small little whack, but any initial player does that. Skates off. You think the play is over. But nope, Jeff Skinner comes over. Wax his leg. Okay, whatever.

You know, gives him another whack. Okay. Cross checks him in the body. You know, probably a penalty. And then right after that, boom, right to the face. that is a easy penalty 10 out of 10 times easy five minute major call 10 times he was disqualified from the game and now that he has the five minute major it has to be reviewed for a suspension and I do think he is going to get suspended how I'm going to touch on that here in a few seconds

and then penguins are able to use that to their advantage they don't score the final 21 seconds of the third period they don't score for the first minute to go overtime but penguins are able to win the game about a minute and a half in thanks to Jeff Carter, Ricardo, Raquel, really nice pass to get it to him who's in front of the net. Carter goes skate to stick, puts a pass Craig Anderson, the Penguins go home with the extra point to stay in third place in the Metropolitan Division in a game where the Penguins, they didn't have their best game, but they'll take that extra point. I mean, you know, the Sabers have played them really tough this season.

And, you know, there's obviously going to be a lot of animosity going into that Saturday game. I'm sure there's going to be some pushing and shoving. Don't know if there's going to be any fights, but I think it's going to get chippy just because of what happened, you know, late in that game. But what a stupid play by Jeff Skinner? I mean, what are we doing here? You know, I don't really care about those few cross-checks before. You want to cross-check him in the leg.

Okay, we'll cross-tech him in the midsection. You know, I see that all the time. Penguins have done that plenty of times. But once it goes up to the head, face area, and you go boom right to the face, that's, you can't do that. Like, he could have lost, like, all this front teeth. that situation and honestly we saw a beginning malcon get a suspension for that remember late last year against the natural predators when malcon put his stick up um to the face oh i i can't remember his

name but you know malcolm because of his history he got a four game suspension and it was deserved you know he you know he had to learn from that and so far he has he hasn't done that sins but it was a stupid play by him and i think jeff skinner is going to learn the hard way here too um I do not want to see anything less than five games here. I know I'm probably setting myself up for failure, and again, I'm not going to be surprised if it is less than five games because George Perros is an absolute moron,

and he has no idea how to run the Department of Player Safety. But they need to send a message here that these kind of plays are not okay. You cannot cross-check someone in the face when they're vulnerable with their teeth like that. Like that's just, that's a garbage play. It's dirty. Like I don't care if it's sitting in Crosby that doesn't.

I don't care if it's out of a Vetch game that doesn't. I don't care if it's, you know, a random AHA call-up. You should get the book thrown at you for that. And I think, you know, he's obviously he's not going to play on Saturday. You know, he should be out for at least the next side games. You know, that's how I see it. You know, he lost the game for the Sabres tonight. The Penguins will say, thank you very much.

I'm glad that they didn't really retaliate. You know, Gensel kind of gave him a couple wax as he was getting wax. But I think, you know, some peasant. past Penguins teams, they would have gone out there and they would have retaliated, you know, under Dan Balsma and stuff like that, Mike Johnston. But under Mike Sullivan, the Penguins know to just play, you know, that's his mantra. And they didn't retaliate. They took the power play and they said, hey, you want to be stupid?

Okay, we're going to go win the game. And that's the best medicine. I will always say that if a team wants to play dirty against the penguins, go out there and win the game against them. Then when they're going off the ice, you can laugh at them, talk all the crowds, you want, you know, just don't retaliate. That was the biggest thing I didn't want them to do there, and I'm glad they didn't. And they went out and won the game, thanks to Jeff Carter getting his first non-empty net goal since October 20th against Los Angeles Kings. It's a spain of 20 games.

So a player that badly needed a goal in Jeff Carter for that one. But yeah, just a really stupid play by Skinner. I don't know what he was doing. I don't know if this is his reputation around the league. I mean, I don't watch a lot of Sabres games, so I don't know. I can't really comment on that much, but, you know, that's the dirtiest play. I think I've seen him make in his career. So just, you know, at least from what I've watched from him, again, I don't watch every Sabers guy. I didn't watch every game when he was in Carolina. But in terms of games that I've seen him play, you know, I don't have really seen anything worse than that, but I'm really dumb and glad the Penguins right when they can pay. And yeah, again, he's not going to be playing

in that game. And, you know, that goal capped off are really, really. strong night for the power play. Two of the goals were scored on the main advantage. That's now four games in a row that the Penguins have scored a powerplay goal. So what I'm saying again, you know, that the movement right now is so beautiful. They're taking their time with the puck. They're not overpassing. They're making sure they get the right look and making the right passes.

And they're finishing their chances. And you saw that tonight on two goals against the one. I'm excuse me. And you saw it in overtime when Raquel. had that really nice pastor carner. He's thinking of, like, hell, he has been awesome. Wait a way.

I mean, he's well worth that contract right now making me eat a little bit of crow. I wasn't crazy on the term. And maybe he was fine, but the term was a little much, but, you know, he's been one of their best players. And I think you can definitely attribute the power play, you know,

the unit turning around to, you know, him coming on there or something that I've been wanting for the last couple weeks. So really glad that he was able to make that play. And the Penguins, you know, not sure how much I would have trusted them in a three-on-three situation just because it hasn't been their bread and butter this year, which is weird to say because they have so many elite players that can play at three-on-three,

but, you know, they will take that power play. I figured because they had the power play going into overtime that this game was 1,000% at least going to go to a shootout. I don't think they were going to lose it in overtime unless they gave up a four-on-three short-handed, which that would have been embarrassing. You give up a four-on, short-hand-n a goal when you have a four-on-three. You should just be sent to Mars, to be honest. But obviously, that did not happen.

But, you know, that was really the big moment or the main moment in tonight's game. And again, really hope Jeff Skinner gets the book thrown at him. There's no place for that in today's any, y'all. There's just not. It's a stupid play. I don't want to see anyone defending that. There's nothing to defend with that play. But I think that'll wrap up this first segment of the podcast.

Coming up in the second segment, we're going to get into a couple of other plays that released it out to me tonight, including the Sidney Crosby play that led to the Ricard Raquel goal, early on in the third period. But before I get to that, obviously I have my bet online for you all on YouTube. It's your number one source for sports betting info stats news and analysis. You can get all the latest odds and trends for every professional amateur league out there. For football to basketball to soccer and e-sports, we've got it all at bedonline.net. And if you love sports podcasts, you can find those at Better Online as well.

We're always the fastest, easiest way to get your betting fix. you can head to the website today or use more with advice to learn more that has been online where the game starts all right i'm back here on this episode of the locked on penguins podcast i am your host hudder hodes moro follow my twitter at hunter hodies follow the shows twitter at lower score penguins and thank you all so much for making this your first list in the day i'm my buddy from college who's a massive sabers and he was watching the game as well and he even said yeah it was a really stupid play from skinner and he would also be stunned if he

was not suspended for the game tomorrow night, which I mean, he will be. I'm sure tomorrow morning you're going to see a hearing. But again, good looking to some other plays that really stood out to me tonight. The Sydney Crosby play early on in the third period. The Penguins have the power play, right? Just finishing up. Looks like the Sabre's going to get it clear. Nope.

Crosby leans towards the boards. Somehow keeps the puck in, gets it. I believe it was to Gensel. and then they're able to get some traveling in front of the net, and then Raquel buries it from the right side, right near the blue paint to tie the game of two, too. But watch that play again from Crosby, the way that he was basically almost to dive across

to keep that puck and play, because I thought it almost went out for a second. I thought it was about to hit the netting or something or just, you know, something like that. But no, because it was able to keep that in, make another one of his superhuman plays, you know, lead to a scoring chance, and then Raquel was able to,

finish in. That just, you know, it's another one of his amazing plays this season, Crosby. That is, and why he should be a serious favorite for the Hart Trophy right now. It's plays like that where, you know, I think some people take him for granted. He is playing at an otherworldly level right now. He doesn't make that play. I don't know if the big ones win this game. So I want to take a couple minutes here to talk about that just because of how awesome it was. You know, I hope I was able to describe it to the best of my abilities. but for those that watched it and those that listen to the game, really just an awesome play.

I can't get enough of how he's playing right now. Brock McGinn, he continues to stay hot. He's basically scoring one goal every couple of games at this point. This is the Brock McGinn that I think a lot of people were expecting to see when he signed that contract. You know, played great in his final year of Carolina, played well in the first half of last season before just kind of going off the rails last season

in the second half of last season in the playoffs. And then for a lot of this season, not playing up to par, but then the last, you know, seven to 10 to 12 games, he has been on another level. So really happy to see him playing on the third line. And just playing on a good level, you know, hopefully he can maybe get an upgraded center

potentially towards the trade deadline. And yes, that's a call for Beau Horvatt from Vancouver. He is my number one target. I will leave it at that. I will touch on that a little later on when we get closer to the trade deadline. But if there is one area that this team, I think, still needs. It is a number three center.

I hate to say it. I know Jeff Carter scored tonight. He's not that guy anymore, people. He's not that guy. So that's that on that. But just a rip of a shot from again. I don't know what Craig Anderson was doing on there just because of the angle.

you know, it was well below the red dot on the right side of the ice. I don't even know how that went in. He's just, you know, and Craig Anderson, he's the goalie where he'll wow you with some saves, but then he'll give up, like, goals like that were just like, how did that even go in? And honestly, throughout Craig Anderson's career, he's been pretty consistent in the way that he'll either have a ridiculous good game where he'll stand on his head. Well, tonight's, like, kind of like, the game that, you know, doesn't count in these two categories. just it's not the norm. I'll say this. But usually with Craig Anderson, he'll make like 50 to 55

saves, give up one or two goals, or he'll just get lit the hell up. There's just no in-between. Tonight, one of those rare in-between moments. He actually played pretty well for the most part, I think, against the Penguins. But, you know, usually it's one or the other. But Penguins are able to get four past him and they were able to come away with the victory. But, you know, again, the Raquel goal was said, oh, that was awesome. Gensel, you know, he extends his point street to five games. He has three goals during that time. Really nice snipe from the left out or just a little bit to the right of it. Really nice screen in front. I believe that was Raquel as well. He has really just transformed that unit ever since he got on in that unit, to be honest with you guys.

So, and I talked about that in the first segment a little bit with the power play. You know, he's been, he's been awesome. And, you know, when Latang's ready to come back, I take Petrie off and I just let, you know, Latang quarterback that unit with Raquel, Crosby, Malcolm, and Gensel. And I would like to see how the unit goes for that. I understand that Petrie's playing well in that unit, but when healthy, that's Latang's unit. So that's how I see it on that. I also really liked the penalty kill tonight.

The Sabres PowerPlay, and it had been pretty hot coming into this game. I believe I saw the graphic on ATT SportsN where they were hovering around, 25 to 30% in the last few weeks. You know, that's a scary unit. Dahlene at the point, got Tage Thompson, Dylan Cousins, Jeff Skinner, no, Victor Oloffson, he's a power play point machine. Usually, they can put the puck in the back in the net. So this was a big test for the penguins in.

The penguins, for the most part, they pass. I know they gave up that goal. Late in regulation with about a, was a buck 30 left of Kyle Oposa, who he's always killed the penguins throughout his career. So I'm not even surprised at this point. but for the most part, otherwise, the Penguins had a really strong night on the penalty kill. Brock McGinn in particular was really nice with his stick play, just poking it away just out of the zone at times. I thought Brian Dumlin was better on the PK at five on five, though.

Not good, I'll get to that a little later on. But, no, I thought for the most part, the penalty kill was extremely solid. Tristan Jari's performance tonight, I don't think any of those three goals were on him. just piss poor defensive coverage, I think, for the Penguins, and I'll get into that in a little bit. But no, none of those big goals, I think, were that's ableable. I think overall, he played a good game. And, you know, he's been red hot for, like, the past three to four weeks.

I was reading actually from Ryan Wilson from Hockey Buzz, and I clicked on one of his articles today. And he actually, you know, put a really good stat in there that I'll share for you all here in the last month. You know, Johnny's really yet to lose in regulation and has over a 9-40s, 8%. percentage. That'll do. You know, he's really turned things around. He's still giving up that sometimes weak goal, but he's been making a lot of good saves. He did that same tonight. Just didn't allow a weak goal, and he continues to give the penguins, you know, adequate goal-tending. Any start. He's not going to play on Saturday. That'll be Casey to Smith's game. He will play, I think, on Monday

against a really good Dallas Starz team. But, you know, I really do think Jari played well tonight overall. From an individual performance perspective, I think that's really, well, let's get to the Gino stuff. Not his best game. Very stupid play. I was just killing me. And I'm just a mess people.

I apologize for this, for those who are watching on YouTube. But, you know, I do think Gino was a little bit of a mess tonight. Took that really stupid penalty with three minutes left on Tage Thompson. You can't help them there, man. Like, that's just a really dumb play. And I tweeted this. I'll say it on the podcast. Gino, I get it.

You want to go for the franchise penalty, men record. You're about 20 minutes away from it. You're going to break it by the time you retire, Penguin. Not at that moment. Do that when you're up 6 to 2 or something like that, man. Just not when the team is trying to defend a three to two lead with three minutes left in the third period. That's just a really dumb penalty to take the penalty kill,

was killing it off in a decent rate before. 4-0-Posos just really stupid, I think overall. So hopefully he learns from that going into Saturday's game and just going forward as well. That will do it, though, for this segment when looking at some individual player performances and just other plays that really stood out for this game. Coming up in the final segment, we're going to look at some things that the penguins need to clean up going into Saturday to make sure that they can sweep this back-to-back because the penguins have been really bad on the second half of back-to-backs.

And also look at the overall underlying numbers from this game and if the Penguins can carry those over into the game as well. So stick around for that right after this commercial break. All right, I am back here on this episode of the Locked-on Penguins podcast. I am your host, Hunter Hodes. We're going to follow me on Twitter at Hunter Hodes, follow the shows Twitter at Elversome Penguins. And of course, thank you so much for making this your first listen of the day.

So let's get into some stuff that the Penguins did not. do well tonight. And I think some of their coverage in front of the net was kind of pissed for, especially towards the late stage of the second period. You know, Gensel gets that goal four minutes left. You're like, okay, going to take a one-nothing lead into the intermission. You're playing well. You know, you're kind of stealing it at that point. I think Jari's made some good saves. The sabers have kind of had the better of the play. But, um, nope, you go down and going into the third, into the third period because the thing has made two brutal changes and the defensive coverage on both goals was really bad. first one um you know just a brutal change ryan newman is out to lunch goes in the back of the net

tris and jari no chance to save that one second one the ruta duma linian pairing is on again and both are out to lunch on now and another player left wide over to the net yon ruta is chilling up the side of the net right towards the right of tris and jari acting like he's drinking a corona on the beach out in like west palm beach something like that don't know what the heck that defensive coverage was but it was ugly. Dumlin, you know, he didn't really make an effort to play the puck in that instance. And again, just a brutal change as well. They were changing while the sabres were coming up the rink. I'm like, what are you doing there? I was just a really ill-advised time for the penguin. So they need to be cautious about that going in the matchup on Saturday. They need to play

better in further net. They need to not have defensemen and their forwards out to lunch in the in-zone coverage because, you know, Tristan's not going to save those. I don't think any goalie is going to make those saves, to be honest with you, unless they're just God. So that's really the one area focused that I would really look into handing into that game. Just, you know, that pairing overall, that Dumlin-Ruta pairing was pretty gross. If I can look at the shift report, nope, that's not the shift report here. And Dumlin struggled across the board tonight.

When he was on ice, I think it was only at 32% of the shot attempts. If I go down to find Jan Ruta here, yeah, 37% of the shot attempts. So when you combine those together, if I can get my mouse going, gee. when you combine those together, 30, 32, 33% overall, gross. Not good enough, it's bad. Again, they were out to lunch on both those goals. You know, that can't be happening moving forward. And, you know, going into the third period, excuse me,

Dumond was like one of the main ice time leaders among all defensemen. And that's crazy because he plays on the second grade. You figured it would be Pedersen and Petrie that would be leading the way there. But nope, it's Dumon, which. you know i don't understand i think the more men to give him the more he struggles um you know he was just totally doing his own thing same with tiela yon ruta acting like he's drinking the corona while listening to you know the pita collata song or something something like that while he's on vacation but that was really the main negatives that i have um about this performance i do think the penguins

were pretty sluggish coming out of the gate i did not like the start at all i had pretty bad vibes and You know, that was, you know, backed up by natural statrick, if you look overall, the numbers at 5B5. The Sabres crushed them in the first two periods, had 24 shot attempts forward to 17 chances against. The Penguins then took it to them in the third period, 15 shot attempts, four, shot attempts against. But the Sabres overall for the game, they did lead in Corsi. They did lead in scoring chances. High danger was close to 50, 50, and then expected goals, the Sabers led 55. Well, about 56 to 44.

I should say, but, you know, the first period was dominated by Buffalo. Second period was kind of the same, you know, that they were, that they had a deserve resolve, but the penguins really took it to them in that final 20 minutes. You know, they were by far the better team. They're in the third period the penguins had, if I look at this up, if I can find this right here, 78% of the shot attempts. They also had 80% of the screening chances and 75% of the high danger chances and 77% of the expected goals.

And that obviously carried over into overtime where the penguins were. able to skate away with the victory. So for this game, I know both teams are going to be all back to back. You're going to have to have shorter shifts, but I want to see the Penguins come out. You know, with a better start. There's going to be a new goaltender in it. I understand that.

But, you know, I don't want to see them get pushed around like they were in the first period. At one point, the shots were 12 to 2 and they were in the same person. That's just not going to. You can't rely on your goal tenor just bail you out every first period. You know, he was, Tristan was the only player that showed up in that period. You can't, you know, you can't ask Casey to Smith and do that. Because, you know, I don't know if he's going to do the same thing. You know, that's just, that's goal-tending.

It's the most volatile position in all hockey. So I think that does it for this episode of the Lockdown Penguins podcast. I don't think I merely missed anything from this game. I'm potentially going to be at that game tomorrow. I'm looking to see if I can secure a ticket, but I'm also trying to make sure that I actually feel better. You know, if I wake up tomorrow and I still feel like that, probably not going to go. but if I do feel better, I do think I will be able to go to the game, but I will definitely be there on Monday.

So if you are going on Monday, just let me know. And maybe we'll meet up there or something. But back does it for this one. Hope you all enjoy listening to it. Again, I apologize with my congested voice. But as it happens when I just, you know, I get a call. One more thing, though. I did want to send my thoughts, my prayers and my condolences to Grant Wall,

who was covering the World Cup in Qatar, on the last several weeks he passed away very unexpectedly on Friday night. We do not really know any of the details, but it's just an unspeakable tragedy. I think I can speak for myself and so many other people that, you know, his knowledge of the game was so vast and he was able to teach so many people about the game of soccer and he was just an incredible journalist. So wanted to end the show with that, you know, my thoughts and my prayers and my condolences go out to him, his family, his friends, and just everyone,

around him during this time. So again, thank you all so much for listening and I will talk with you all on Monday.