Locked On Penguins - Daily Podcast On The Pittsburgh Penguins - The Penguins win again...but it comes at a cost

Episode Date: January 25, 2022

Another day, another win for the Pittsburgh Penguins! Hunter recaps Sunday's game against the Winnipeg Jets and how it was a tale of two halves. The Penguins stunk in the first two periods, but then rallied in the third and overtime to win in a shootout. Hunter first touches on how the Penguins can limit the 2-on-1's moving forward, plus how a slow start shouldn't have been surprising due to how this looked to be a "scheduled loss." He also touches on Tristan Jarry's performance and how he's gotten better at breakaways and odd-man rushes, plus starts the #JarryforVezina campaign. Finally, Hunter speaks on some of Winnipeg's dirty hits, Sid's shootout winner, Kapanen's resurgence, and a whole lot more.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 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, happy Monday. Make it five in a row now for the Pittsburgh Penguins. What is that? 16 of their last 18 as well. Second place right now in the Metropolitan Division as I record this. We're going to do a full game recap of the game against Winnipeg. Coming up right after this drop. You're Locked-on Penguins. Your daily podcast on the Pittsburgh Penguins. Part of the Locked-on Podcast Network. Your team every day. Hello, welcome to this Monday evening edition of the Locked-on Penguins podcast. I'm your host, Hunter Hodes. You're going to follow me on Twitter at Hunter Hodes. You can also follow the shows, Twitter, at L. Lawrence War Penguins. And, of course, thank you all so much for making this your first listen of the day. It didn't look pretty for a lot of Sunday's game against the Winnipeg Jets,

but the Penguins were able to come victorious out from a shootout after also being down to nothing going into the third period. They scored two goals in nine seconds to tie it, threatened for the rest of the period. I've had a ridiculous overtime, and then, of course, Sidney Crosby's lone shootout goal gets the Penguins, their fifth trade win and catapulted them to the second spot in the Metropolitan Division. Starting off, I mean, let's just call a spade a spade. The Penguins played mostly like a dog, a bunch of dog crap, I would say, for the first 40 minutes.

Just a really piss, poor performance at both ends of the ice, especially defensively. You know, poor Jake Decker, shout out to him on Penguins' Twitter. You're on social media and you do not follow him. I believe his Twitter is Jake underscore Decker 8771, I think is what it is. Some of those numbers, at least. Shout out to him. He's a great follow for all the Penguins games. He was doing a headcount of how many odd man rushes they were giving up.

And God bless his soul, because if I had to do that, I probably would have drank bleach. I believe halfway through the game, it was up to about 14 or 15 to 30 minutes. That's just unacceptable. And, you know, I know this game was, you know, the so-called scheduled loss just because they had played three games prior to you know this was basically you know their third game in not even four nights it's the third game in like three and a half days you could tell that they were definitely gas when the peg had the jump on them i understand that the penguins were out shooting them by a pretty hefty margin people need to people how do i want

to say this you can't just look at the shot total and be like oh my god wow this team definitely outplayed the other team it was the complete opposite at least going to into the third period. Winnipeg had a really great jump. Just, you know, the penguins were giving up two on ones, virtually every shift. Outside of that, I don't think Winnipeg had a lot of offense. It was just the penguins were so bad at handling the puck that it looked like Winnipeg was having a lot more offense than they did. It was just so many oddman rushes.

And they were lucky that Tristan Jari stood on his head. I'm going to get to him in just a second. But with some of those turnovers, you know, just speaking on some of the negatives, I think part of it has to do with Evgeny Malkin being on the point on the power play. I've never liked him in that spot. If you want to, obviously he should be on the top power play. He's one of the best players in the league. But if you want to take advantage of his skills, put him on the right far boards,

feed him his Gino bombs, and let that be that. Or you can put him on the other side and, you know, see if he can be a playmaker from over there. If you're putting him at the point, you're doing yourself a disservice because He hasn't really been good at it for the last few years. And that's actually, if you want to criticize something in Hvgeny Malkins game, that's fair game to me. Sure, does he also take some bad offensive zone penalties? Absolutely. That's fair game as well.

Some of the other stuff I've seen throwing out there, you know, the structure, the chemistry, all this other stuff. That's just a bunch of garbage. But his play on the point on the power play, that's a legitimate concern and a reason to have a little bit of gripes with Gino's game. never been good. It was really bad on Sunday against Winnipeg. And, you know, he was just coughing up the puck like it was a grenade. And Kyle Connor was just coming in on about, what, three to four short-handed opportunities. And Jari was, you know, having to bail his ass out. Chris Letang, I think it was the same a little bit. It wasn't as much as Gino, but he was still not making the best decisions with the puck that were used to seeing. Their panel play was honestly just a

cluster. Just really not getting a lot of good schooling chances. I believe they were 0 of 4, 0 of 5. for the game just because they had a lot of power play opportunities that's the thing they just weren't able to cash in on it because i mean the zone entries were horrendous the turnovers at the point were really bad the passes in the offensive zone were awful they were not getting to the high danger chances it was all just pathetic and you know again the penguins are really lucky that they're able to somehow score two goals in nine seconds in the third to make up for a lot of those lost opportunities that they have on the manpower advantage so um I do want to see some of that cleaned up.

The Penguins have only allowed three short-handed goals this year. That's one of the best marks in the league halfway through. So right now they're only on pace to have six. Again, that would be one of the best marks in the league. If that were to hold up through the 82 game season, again, you know, the Penguins just have to be better at managing the Puck and those situations. I did not like that. Even at even strength, they weren't generating a lot of offense.

They were being caved in into the defensive zone. It was just not a pretty performance. And I tweeted this out on my social media channels. It honestly looked worse than the Los Angeles than the Calgary efforts. And because at least in L.A., they were getting chances and they had scored a couple prior to the third where it all broke loose. This time, you know, the rules were, well, they were reversed a little bit. So, you know, obviously the Penguins were able to, they were able to get a couple bounces. And, you know, Casperi Kappan loved the goal that he scored.

He finally went to the net. And boy, was he on one in that third period. That is probably the best period I've ever seen Kappan in play this season. He was just all over the ice, both offensively and defensively. That's the version of Kappi that we all saw last year when he was just, you know, running wild with Gino on his line. And, you know, I thought Gino really warmed up a lot in the third. period as well, especially in overtime.

I'm going to get to that a little later on in this episode. But, you know, Capon was just lying out there, and he was rewarded by going to the net, getting a nice little deflection with that one, and then the penguins were able to cut it to one, and then big Jeff Carter gets another goal. Kind of Lucky Bounce. I don't really know what Connor Hellebuck was doing behind the net there, but I know one listener wanted me to point this out, and it was a hit that Carter had, you know, that led to that goal. You know, I'm not really big on physicality in hockey or hitting in general.

I'm, you know, I'm of the opinion that if you have a lot of hits, that means you don't have the puck. That's just where I stand on it. Sure, it still matters a little bit. And as I'm about to say, this hit actually did matter because it created a goal for the penguins and it changed the momentum. and Carter was able to score directly after that hit because, you know, Hellowbach, you know, he goes to where Hellebuck has the puck. He basically just gives it right to him and then sheets it in from a bad angle, goes off his pad and then, you know, if it probably, if it maybe wasn't for that hit, you know, Carter doesn't score there, sure.

Again, no, that said, I'm not usually someone that's big on physicality in hockey. I don't think it usually changes the momentum a lot, though for this one, it definitely did. You know, there's outliers for everything. And, you know, those are my thoughts on that. But, you know, for the game, excuse me, it is interesting because the Penguins, they controlled 55% of the shot attempts at 5E5. They control 56% of the scoring chances at 5E5, 62% of the high danger chances at 5E5, 54% of the expected goals, 45% for Winnipeg. It was, it mainly had to do with just, you know, how bad.

their first two periods were. And honestly, natural statuary kind of goes against that a little bit because it says that the Penguins had 65% of the shot attempts in the first period. And then the second period was where the Penguins, their play created a little bit. And the third period, they started turning it on a little bit. So, you know, the numbers definitely don't match the I test as much, which obviously, you know, that's a little bit interesting. But, you know, they still probably carried play a little more than even I thought, you know,

after looking at these numbers yet again. We'll still have a lot more to get to for this episode of Locked on Penguins. I apologize if I went, you know, all over the map for this first segment. I'm not usually like that. It's just, you know, this game is just really weird to analyze just because, I mean, it was just kind of like a tale of two periods and then two pretty good ones for the Penguins. I want to count the overtime. And then they're able to win it in a skills competition.

So I just, I don't really know what to make of it as much. We're going to get into what Tristan Jolly Talk coming up here. in the next segment of getting Malkins, ridiculous deacon overtime. The Sydney Crosby's shootout winner. Going to go into some of the hits that the Winnipeg Jets laid on the Penguins and why it's kind of BS that there were no penalties called. And of course, you know, a whole lot more. We're going to do maybe do a little preview of the game against Arizona on Tuesday. Before we do that, though, it is a New Year.

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That's the thing. Billop bars are covered in 100% chocolate. Most of them contain 130 calories, 4 grams of sugar and 4 grams of net carbs, and 17 grams of protein. Here's an idea for the new year. Go to all your secrets to street stashes. Maybe it's at home in the pantry. at the office in the car, throw out all the sugary or calorie-filled treats and replace them with bill bars. So when you're craving a snack or treat, you can reach for something that's

healthy and taste incredible. There's many flavors to choose from, you know, coconut almond, peanut butter brownie, raspberry, cookies and cream, et cetera. Remember, it's the code Locked15 at built.com. All right, welcome back to this episode of the Lockdown Penguins podcast. I'm your host, Hunter Hodeys. Remember follow me on Twitter at Hunter Hote. at hello underscore penguins. Let's just get into some of those hits that we saw. So the worst news came out on Monday, in case you all did not see on the penguin social media,

maybe you've got it on your phone and all that. Teddy Bluger is going to be out for the next six to eight weeks with a broken jaw. It didn't look like that after the hit. I know he was bleeding from his mouth, but I thought maybe he lost a few teeth or something. Of course, it's the penguin, so we have to have a worst case scenario here. That came after a pretty dirty hit,

I would say from Brendan Dillon. I'm not surprised the guy is kind of a stain, played with the Capitals for a few years, kind of always went after of Gennie Malkin for some reason, was just, I think, a piss baby against the Penguins for a lot of years. Never really understood him. He didn't really do anything prior to that. But, you know, the last few years, you know,

he's been in Washington now he's played in Winnipeg. He's just always been someone that's, you know, on the durrier side of things. He jumped into the hit, elbowed him basically right to the face slash head area. The refs convened, and then they didn't call a penalty. I don't really know what we're doing here if that's not a penalty. That was principal contact to the face slash head area.

The guy, Teddy Bluger, was obviously injured, and you're not going to call a penalty of it because of reasons. I just, I don't really understand that, you know, I guess I don't understand anything which with it comes to NHL officiating. I never have. There's a reason why I say that this is probably the worst officiated sport of the four major sports in the United States. They just, they don't know how to call penalties.

There was one, I can remember which player that it was for Winnipeg, boarded Brock McGinn from behind, pretty dangerous hit. That's not called. And I'm like, these are two pretty blatant penalties. That one probably should have been a two-minute minor. The other one I think should have been at least a minor as well. And we're not calling them and thinking that this is just playoff officiating here. I just, I don't know, man.

You know, this is why I don't, you know, subscribe to the notion that, well, you know, the league is fixed for some certain teams. No, it's just that the officials suck for every team in the league and they don't know how to call penalties. And speaking of that, the overtime was just filled of penalties. You have Jeff Carter cross-checking. I think it was Mark Schifley in front of the net.

You have Schifley then cross-checking him right after. You have a bunch more players just blatantly tripping other players, not getting called. It was like, wow, I didn't know a three on three for five minutes. It's just going to be refereed. Like, it's game seven of the Stanley Cup final here. It's just like, and I get it. Everyone loves three on three.

You want to see even shank. You want to see as little people out there as possible. You don't want a full on three power plate aside the game. But at some point, when the penalties become even more blatant, you've got to call something. I don't really know why the Winnipeg announcers. I was listening to TSN on one of the streaming sites when I was watching the game while I was working.

And they thought that Sidney Crosby should have gotten a penalty after he ran into Connor Hellebuck. But if you watch the replay, he was pushed into him by Pierre-Luc Dubois. And they're out here saying that like Sid ran into him by himself. I'm like, if you look at the replay, that's just not true. You've got to take off the glasses there a little bit. But I just, and you know, I get it.

You know, it's the away announcers. They broadcasted, you know, Numerous other Winnipeg Jets games are obviously going to be, you know, a little bit of favoritism there. But you got to be a little fair to some of these other, you got to be fair to the opposition, I should say. There were a couple other times where they said that these are not penalties that they called on Winnipeg when they were actually blatant infractions.

And, you know, I understand that the Jets probably didn't get as many calls as they deserved. But again, that just goes to show that how bad officiating is in the NHL. I mean, if I had to say this, I think that was probably the worst officiated game that the thing. have been in all season. And that's not really something. If you've been listening to this podcast all year, I haven't really been complaining a lot about officials.

I try my best not to just because, you know, they have their job to do. And, you know, I know officiating, you know, sport of hockey is a bit difficult. But they, they left a lot to be desired in this game. And, you know, again,

I did not like how Winnipeg was just kind of gooning it up a little bit, you know, in the first couple periods. You know, there was a time where four penguins forwards were out there. They're lucky that the only injured player to come out of that was teddy bluger again you know on a pretty bad hit um to be frank but redeems zohorna was called up i would assume that he'll be in the line up moving forward until teddy comes back not sure what's going to happen with jason zulker he's still week to week at this point so um right now so everyone is fully healthy but you know simone's going to be in boyle is going to be in and zohorna

um is probably going to be in as well so oh and of course forgot about this ashton rase he's still day-to-day with lower body injury penguins is not practicing We will see if he'll practice tomorrow in advance of the Arizona game. He was out walking his beautiful little dog in the snow the other day, so it doesn't look like what's bothering him is too serious. But we'll have to see on that. Before I get to a commercial break, Tristan Jari, I don't know what to say at this point. I think we all would have accepted him to be league average this year, you know, 910, 915, maybe even 916. I didn't expect the guy to be like 930, 935.

I'm expecting to be top three in Goles 8 above expected going into this week. I mean, he is playing the best hockey of his life right now. And he saved the Penguins' butts in that game. And just with all the saves on the two-on-ones, and over time the Jets had a few more odd men rushes, a couple of other scoring chances, and a couple of breakaways as well. And he just slammed the door. You know, the work that he has done on breakaways this season,

you know, ever since those struggles in the shoot-up, out has been just second to none. This is a completely different goal with what we're watching right now. And obviously, you know, it's only been one half of regular season. Let's see how he finishes. But I'm feeling really confident about him going into the playoffs. And I think we really have to start discussing him as a true Vezna contender. I know he yours to Sturkin is the odds on favor right now.

Rightfully so. He leads the league and goal state of the above expected to save his and his attention. out there as well. He is one of the main reasons the Rangers are where there, if not the main reason outside of Panarin. But behind him, I would have Tristan Jari as the second best goal tenor hockey this year. I know Brabophe's been awesome. Frederick Anderson, Jack Campbell, a couple others who I know I'm missing. But, I mean, he's just been on another level. And I think more and more people need to start realizing that because if he can play like this come April, this team is going to be really,

and I mean really tough to beat in a best of seven series. So shout out to Tristan. That was I thought his best performance of the season. It couldn't have come at a better time, especially because the team was playing so bad in this game. But, you know, I'm loving what he's doing. Obviously, they have to go out and get a backup.

I mean, that's no secret right now, people. I mean, they have no choice, I think, at this point. But hopefully they will, and, you know, they can give him the rest that he deserves. but he's just been awesome and you know I think more and more people around the league need to start realizing just how special this season he's having so shout to Tristan great start I would assume he'll start against Arizona but I wouldn't be surprised at just Smith gets it just because it is the coyotes are the worst team in hockey this year so coming up with the next segment we're going to go into the

shootout sending Crosby's goal of getting Malkins ridiculous deacon the overtime a couple of other things as well before we do that though bed online would like to wish you'll be happy new betting years we continue our march to the playoffs and beyond. Ben Online remains the number one spot for all the best sports action for 2022. It is a new year, and that means there's a new updated desktop and mobile website to sign up today and receive your 50% off welcome bonus on your first deposit. Just use your porn code locked on to get started. Betterline is as fast as an easiest way to wager on all of your favorite sports.

That is, Ben Online, where the game starts. All right, welcome back to this episode of the Lockdown Penguins podcast. I am your host, Hunter Hoodies. in order to follow me on Twitter at Hunter Hodes, follow the show's Twitter at L.O. Armstrongs were Penguins. I'm also looking right now to see the scores. The Capitals are down 1-0 as I record this

to the Golden Knights with about seven minutes left. The Rangers are down to 1 right now to the L.A. Kings. So pretty good news tonight with the Metro. If the Rangers lose in regulation, the Penguins will have two games in hand on them and they'll have an opportunity to potentially be first in the Metro tomorrow. But going back to the shootout, I know I usually hamper on Siv for not deeking.

I mean, I would love to see him deak a lot more. He's one of the greatest players to ever play. But I still love it when he comes in a little slowly and then just snaps it right past the goal. You know, he waded out Hellowuck a little bit, got the look he was looking for, boom, snapped in, and then, you know, draw was able to make a save. Latang didn't score,

then he was able to make the last save. Ever since that really bad start in the shootouts, I think he's only allowed, one goal and I want to say the last six or seven attempts. This was their first shootout pretty positive since the game against Calgary about seven eight weeks ago. And he was rock solid and that one, to say the least. And he didn't allow any in this one.

And that shootout went about what, seven, eight rounds. This one went three. So he's only really allowed one goal in his last eight to ten shootout rounds. That's much better. You can definitely see that he's worked a lot on breakaways. such he's not making himself, you know, look small than that. But loved what Sid did there. That was just a vengeance and he drives me shootout goal.

I'm, I'm going to make him, there was at least a few moments in the overtime where I thought he was going to bring the house down, the last of which has the puck right next to hellabup. Kind of just trying to settle it down, right? And then Shepley comes over, does a little lop, and then puts the puck around him. And then Shepley just basically just slides down. And it was just like, oh my God, if he scores that. the whole, again, PPG paint screen is just going to collapse,

just because how loud it's going to be. puts a shot right on Helibuck's blocker, and I was just like, man, if he scored that, that would have been something to behold. I thought Gino, outside of his struggles a little bit on my power play, I thought he looked fine.

You know, the thing is, this was only, you know, his seventh game played of the season. You know, remember, it took Cid about seven, eight games to get going. He only had three points in those games. Gino already has seven points in his first seven games.

He's averaging a point per game. Sooner rather than later, it's going to get even better. He doesn't have his legs fully back yet. That's fine. He missed eight months due to injury. He's going to be fine. That's the thing here. But I loved the work that his line did.

You know, Cappan and Honey, you know, Hinen I thought had a pretty good game as well. He had a couple of really good scoring chances. Rodriguez, I also thought he looked pretty good. we were finally starting to see erot again. I know he's gone a little bit cold, and I need not remind you all that he was never going to keep up at that point per game production. He's already set a career high end points and goals this season.

You know, he probably was not going to be a 70-point player. That's just a little far. But he had a couple of really strong scoring opportunities in this game. I would hope that would continue going into the next game. We'll have to see. I know he hasn't scored in the last couple of weeks. That's fine. you know, he still had a really good season.

No one's really going to fault him for that. Of course, he's going to go in a little bit of a scoring slump. That's what all the best. That's what all good players do, you know, at some point in their careers. Coming up next year for the Penguins, they have a day with the Arizona Coyotes on Tuesday night. FPG Paints Arena, this will be their second game in their six game home in San Arizona. You know, they're horrendous this year, 10 and 26 and 4. Clay and Keller, though, has been pretty good, 15 goals, 31 points in 40 games.

Kessel has also been. pretty good this year. Five goals, 27 points in those 40 games. He hasn't scored a lot just because he's getting a bit older, but he's still been a pretty good playmaker for Arizona. You know, our old friend, Phil the thrill here. He actually leads them in a assist. Calder leads the team in points. But, you know, this is a team that's strictly tanking this year. I mean, they're bad. They'll probably get a trade Jacob trick run here. At some point, he's one of the best defenseman hockey. I think they are going to get a good package back for him. And as it looks like right now, I don't think, yeah, he's still a bit banged up.

He's been hurt for the last little while here, so he will not be playing for Arizona in this game. Just looking at the lines here, I mean, they have two goalies. You know, Scott Wedgwood is one of them. Vegmalka, I think, is the other one, and I don't even really know who he is. I mean, the fact that he's a starting goaltender this year for that team, I mean, that tells you all you need to know

about where the direction that team is going. and look at their lines. Nick Schmalt's on the top line with Clayton Keller, Larson with Kessel and Crows on the second line. Andrew Ladd, yes, he is back in the NHL with Fisher on the third line, Gowchenyuk with Louis Erickson on the fourth line. Defensively, old friend Shane Gassus Bear is on the top pairing. And then actually, though, that is my mistake.

I apologize. So, Chikrin is back. Last I checked, he was hurt, but I believe he did just make his return to the lineup. So I apologize. on that. And just looking at it, yeah. So, yeah, he just came back. So I don't really know what I'm talking about anymore.

Anyways, that'll do it for this one of Lockdown Penguins Podcast. The next episode will come Tuesday evening, a full game recap of the game against Arizona. After that, the Penguins will be off on Wednesday, play Seattle on Thursday, Detroit on Friday, and then L.A. on Sunday, and then Monday they'll get Washington. So full week of episodes ahead here for the Lockdown Penguins podcast. The grind does not stop. all of you listening to this one. I apologize that this one was a little all over the place. This one was just kind of a weird game, you know, just looking at my notes-wise and just,

you know, talking about. Um, no, that's probably not going to be the note. No, I'm going forward. That's for sure. Again, thank you all so much for listening to this one, and I'll be back with another episode on Tuesday.