Locked On Penguins - Daily Podcast On The Pittsburgh Penguins - Wildest Penguins game of the season, right?

Episode Date: January 25, 2023

How's everyone doing after that crazy game? Hunter starts the episode off by getting into the core players and how they were the main reason why the Penguins were able to bring this home. He especially shouts out Kris Letang for his heroics and how his dad was definitely with him while he was on the ice for this game. He analyzes how he played offensively and how the Penguins badly missed him over this last month. He then gets into how Evgeni Malkin and Sidney Crosby had VINTAGE performances in this one and how the power play in particular really needed that spark that Malkin was able to provide it. He also laughs at how Ryan Lomberg poked the bear (Crosby) and why it's never wise to do that. After that, he does address Casey DeSmith's performance and how it was the worst one of the year. He analyzes what he saw from PPG Paints Arena and if this is going to be the norm going forward or if this was just an outlier. He also does make the point that he can't get too many starts in a row because he's just not built for that. Finally, Hunter praises the 4th line for having one of their best games of the season as Drew O'Connor and Danton Heinen were all over the ice. 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.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/NHLNETWORKFanDuelMake Every Moment More. Place your first FIVE DOLLAR bet to get ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY DOLLARS in Free Bets – win or lose! Visit Fanduel.com/LockedOn today to get startedFANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as non-withdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN)  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.

So is everyone calm down from that 76 crazy Penns-Cats game? I hope you all are. What a crazy freaking finish. In today's episode, we're going to get into everything regarding this crazy game. To start, though, the core and how they put the team on their backs to win this one. It's all coming up right after this drop. You're locked on penguins.

Your daily podcast on the Pittsburgh Penguin. part of the Locked-on Podcast Network, your team every day. Hello and welcome back to a late Tuesday edition of the Lockdown Penguins podcast. I am your host, Hunter Hodes. You're going to follow me on Twitter at Hunter Hodes. Follow the shows, Twitter, Eleanor-Score Penguins.

And, of course, thank you all so much for making this your first listen of the day. Today's episode is brought to you by FanDual Sportsbook, the official sportsbook of Lockdown, make every moment more. You can visit fandual.com slash lockdown today. who gets started. So Penguin 7, Panther 6, one of the craziest games of the 2020, 2022-203 Pittsburgh Penguin season to date, a game that they needed to win, especially standings-wise, and they pulled it out in heroic fashion. But who were the stars of the day here? You guessed it. The Big Three. This is a classic game where some people that wanted,

you know, some of the Big Three gone over the offseason, hope you, A Crow. especially for this one. What a performance from Sidney Crosby, Evgeny Malkin, and especially Crystal Teng. We are going to start right there for this episode. Crystal Tang, first game back in almost a month. First came back also since his father really sadly passed away. I still send my condolences to him and his family and his friends during this very difficult time.

You can tell that he was really playing for his dad tonight. What a performance that he put on display for the Penguins tonight. Two goals, two assists, gets his third and fourth goals of the season. He was absolutely on fire tonight for the Penguins. It looked like he was maybe going to be a bit weird because he was skating with Brian Dumlin for this game. I had noticed that earlier on in the day. I'm like, I don't know about that one, Mike. I think what their logic was with that.

Pedersen-Petree has been one of the best second pairings in the play. league. You know, the third pairing, they can really do whatever they want, P.O.J. Which however we'd all, it's been fine. I thought that third pairing was also really good tonight. Brian Dumont, for the most part, was fine. But, you know, you look at the top of hockey stats cards tonight when you use the date for natural stat trick, let's hang easily the Penguins best defenseman tonight.

Only behind Drew O'Connor, Ryan, Killing, and Dayton Hinen for the best skaters tonight. For offense, offensive impact above average, Laetang was well over. over one. So he was elite with that. And then also in terms of just, you know, production, miscellaneous, face off penalties, player points into that individual actions, excuse me, well over three. The only way, a place where he gave it back a little bit was his defense a little bit below average with that. But offensively tonight, he was spectacular. I hope everyone out there chronicled what he did. Wink, wink, you all, everyone that is on Penguin's Twitter, I think knows what I am talking.

talking about. But spectacular performance from him. What a rip to win that game in overtime with less than a minute to go Alex Lyon. I don't really think knew where the puck was, but, you know, great feat from Gino. And after a couple of bad power plays, you know, P.P. really woke up tonight with, you know, two, three goals from that unit. Really nice to see that tonight. Moving on a little bit. Evgeny Malkin, he gets another goal tonight, his 17th of this. season, just a bomb from the right circle. And it's almost like, again, I will keep saying this. Keep feeding of Guinea Malkin, one-timers on the power play, and you will see the reward. And that is exactly what happened tonight. They kept flirting with it. Malkin fired a couple

one-timers. A couple shots were blocked. The one that was not, though, Lyon had no chance on it. Malkin scores with five minutes left. Probably should have been the game winner. Casey DeSmith was not good tonight. I will get into that. that later on in the show. And we'll get into if this is going to be the norm for him or if this is just an outlier, we have all that to touch on it, a lot more. But, you know, Malkin, he also brought it

just a ridiculous one-timer. And I'll keep saying this too. I obviously know Alex Ovechkin probably has the best one-timer in the league. I think he's the greatest goal score to ever live. The Penguins will see him on Thursday. I will have a full preview episode for that on Wednesday. But in terms of one-timers after Ovechkin, there's probably not many that probably not many players that you can say have a better one-timer than Malkin.

He absolutely lasers that thing. When he gets the puck on his stick, it is a sight to behold. And again, Alex Lyon, no chance on that one. Two, you know, great goals, three great goals, I will say, from Malkin and Lenten combined. And, of course, you cannot forget Sidney Patrick Crosby. Ryan Longbird made the mistake of poking the bear. just a little too much. They were engaged, from my vantage point,

I was there with my girlfriend. No, you do not, I think I'm about to sneeze. I'm not sure if it's coming. Okay, come on. If it's gonna come, you can, I can sneeze any time now. Okay, I think it's not gonna come.

Anyways, that would have been really weird. Anyways, you know, Longberg and Crosby, we're kind of engaging in a lot of pushing and shoving for 15, 20 seconds. Longberg was baiting Crosby to fight. He was about to drop his gloves. He's like, come on, buddy. Come on. Sid's like, nope, not going to do that.

And, you know, again, that would have been stupid. You're going off the ice. If he would have engaged in a fight with him, you would be going off the ice with a career third and fourth liner. You know, that's a trade off the panders would take every time. Glad that the penguins, or she's been glad that Crosby saw that. It was just like, no, screw that, we're not doing that.

But right after that, when the bear was poked, said, answered the bell. picked off a turnover, the blue line on the power play, comes in all alone, those backhand five-hole pass line, and that thing was wide open. You could have hit a beach fall in between that space. That was open for Alex Lyons' five-hole.

And that's Sally that Sid did, haven't seen too many of those this year from the captain. You know, he did a, I read his words, I read his lips excuse me, where he was basically just like, F and right, you know, I'm sure you all that listen to the show can translate that. not going to say the whole word on this podcast.

But, you know, he did a pretty big selling here. He was fired up after that goal. But tonight, just, you know, a ridiculous game from the Penguins' core players. And this is the kind of game that, you know, how do I want to say this? This is the kind of game where you just have to be so thankful that the Penguins decided to bring back all three of Crawsumont. and the Tang, the Sheryl-Latang. Four points in this one. Crosby, a goal and two-assist.

Malkin. Same stat line. You know, just tremendous stuff from all three of them. And without all that production, the Penguins, they do not come out in front of this game. So I really wanted to spend this segment going into the core saying they are the reason why they won this game. And also just say, you know, for those some people that think that Chris Lentang is not important to this lineup, you know, learn more about the sport. because you also how good he was tonight. He can continue that pace for the rest of the season.

Not even that pace with four-point games, but if he can continue to look that good in the offensive zone, Penguins are going to win a lot more games here. They have to get Jury-healthy. They get into that in this next segment. But, man, just a tremendous game from 58 and 87 to 71. I can't say enough about that. tonight, you know, you dive into the stats a little bit more tonight.

The top line of Gensel Crosby, Rust, when Crosby was on the ice, the penguin said 60% of the shot attempts. They also had 58% of the scoring chances, 50% of the high danger chances, expected goals 71.4%. So not bad in terms of that. Looking else to see here. When the Tang was on ice, if you want to just go individually, when he was on ice, the penguin said 60%,

of the shot attempts. They also had, if I find this correct here, 59% of the expected goals for and 63% of the scoring chances for, 62% of the high gameer chances for, all of that comes via 5V5. The data matches the eye test tremendous games from all three. So, yeah, that's how in this first segment. I'm sure you all are wondering what the heck was wrong with Casey Smith. I got good news for you.

Coming up right after this commercial break, I'm going to tell you what exactly was wrong with dismissing this one. And if this was just an outlier for him or if this is maybe the norm for him going forward. But before we get into that, the wonderful new, a little overlay for fan dual sportsbook here. The NFL playoffs are here with the conference championships this weekend. We're really excited about our new sports betting partner for lockdown because they are the number one sports book in America. They are Fanduel. And if you are new to Fanduel, that's even better.

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the official sportsbook partner of the NFL and Locked On. All right, I'm back here in this episode of the Locked on Penguins podcast. I am your host, Hunter Hodes. I'm going to follow me on Twitter at Hunter Hodes. Follow the show, I'm going to LRs for Penguins. And of course, thank you all so much for making this your first listen of the day. And take a sip of my water there. So let's get right into it.

Easily the worst player on the ice night for your Pittsburgh Penguins was Casey to Smith. May they say surprise start, excuse me. Tristan Jari was expected to be the starting goaltender night was announced as a starting goaltender after the morning escape. Mike Sullivan said he found out right when he got to the rank that he was not going to be playing. And we all saw that to Smith led them on to the ice for warmups. Jari was not there.

Sullivan confirmed after the game that it is a upper body injury. So for those wondering, it is not related to the groin injury that he had over the past couple of weeks. That looks like it is healed. This is a new injury. I know. I've already seen some jokes on Penguin's Twitter about,

oh, this is Beau Bennett part two. No, there are limits, people. There are limits here. But I will say, it is getting a little concerning

that he is kind of been made of glass at this point. No offense to him, but the injury count at this point is a little too much for me. You know, going back to last year, got hurt,

had to miss most of the first of, first round this year had a grand injury and winner classic and now this you know that's three injuries in the span of seven months not good not good to say the least so just sniff comes in he starts and for my vantage point i'm sorry yin's look like he wasn't even trying on some of those goals that he'll out you know even i went with my girlfriend tonight who she you know she she's not the biggest hockey fan to say the least you know i'm getting her more into it now that she's here and you know now. We've been dating for a few years and stuff. But, you know, even she turned to me a few times. And it was like, does he even look like he's trying out there or is he hurt? And, you know, I didn't really have an answer.

Part of me is wondering if he was a bit banged up because his movement on some of those goals was just really slow. His reaction time was awful. I don't know what that was. And, you know, this was easily, I think, the worst start of this season for him. probably the worst star I think I've seen him make in his Penguins tenure. But, you know, this is the thing with the Smithy's. He's the classic, and I've used this reference a lot for different things for the Penguins this season, and I'll use it again here. He is very Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. He's either really freaking good or he's really freaking bad.

And, you know, he came into this game with a 904% percentage. The league average this year is 9-05. So he's trucking along league average. That's fine goal-tending. The problem with, you know, the problem, you know, I know people want to move on for him. And trust me, you know, I was all for them moving on from DeSmith in the off-season. But the problem is, you know, there are worse options than him.

There are probably more worse options than him out there. That's the point I'm trying to make. You know, I'll try to, it was probably, it came out weird. there are probably more worse options out there than better options in terms of backups for a KC does miss that's how I'll say it um it was just it wasn't good enough though I will say that I think you're probably going to see him play better and his next start it's hard to be worse than this when you give up six goals and that game should have been over in regulation I mean you know the Aaron Eckbaud goal for example didn't even look like he tried

to make a save on that on the Carter for Hagee goal with two and a half minutes to go into third period, just got deeped out of his socks. I don't, he looked like he didn't even try to make the save on there. And that was a weird balance that got it to, that got it to Verhege in the defensive zone. But still, make an effort, at least. You know, the other goal that he allowed, I think that was the one that made it three to two.

I think that was the other of Verhege goal. Puck's coming down. I think it's Jeff Petit, one of Jeff Pettersson that's trying to get back to it. But they're kind of leaving a B because they're expecting to Smith to come out. Well, he comes out. it's just that he doesn't come out fast enough because you usually see the top goaltenders in the league be really aggressive when the puck is you know i wouldn't say close to the blue line but you know

kind of in that slodger you know we used to see brayden holby of the washington capitals come out you know past the blue line to really clear the puck you know i've seen egos shes stork and new yorkers do this you know plenty of other goals a leia syrokin i think has done it um and smith was just not aggressive he was like am i going to do it i mean i should i do it should i not oh okay I'm going to do it, but I'm going to do a really bad job of it. And Berhege gets the easy goal of his life. He just pokes it right past him. It's like, commit to it in that situation.

So, you know, just a really ugly game. If the Penguins had lost this game, you know, it would have been bad. You know, there was just, there was no reason to lose this game because the Penguins outplayed the Panthers for the majority of this game. I'm going to get into some of the stats a bit after this. But, you know, this team, you know, if Jari is hurt, you know, did. day, you know, if he's out for a couple weeks again, his team might be up a creek. I know they have the All-Star break coming up, thankfully.

They have two more games for them on the Washington Capitals and the same as the shirts, but they need Tristan Jarre to stay healthy for the rest of the season. You cannot rely on Casey to Smith to carry you through a long stretch of games. He's just, he's not built to play that many games. And, you know, it's been like that for, you know, his entire career. again, you know, he's stunk tonight. It was probably this worst start of the season, but I will say this again for you all, for those that missed it.

Had a 904, 8 percentage, league average is 905. He's also 30th out of 53 goalies that have played this year in goals stayed above expected. Again, he is a regular run-of-the-mill backup. I know, is this not ideal? Yes, would I like to have someone like Charlie Lingren from the Washington Capitals? Absolutely, you know, when Darcy Kemper got hurt,

Lingren went in there and was just amazing. So, you know, I would love to have someone like that, but the Penguins, they thought bringing to Smith back was the right move. You know, you can argue whichever way. I personally think, you know, it was the wrong move, but, you know, they made that decision and you know that they're living with it right. They're living with it right now. And they'll have to make a big decision after this season,

I think on both boys, because if Tristan, you know, if he's fine the rest of the way, but he's a bit bang, up and the same thing with DeSmith because he's been hurt two playoff runs in a row. There's just no way you can bring back this same goaltitting tandem for what? A fourth straight season at that point. So I don't think this start is going to be the norm for DeSmith. I think six goals is a little bit of an outlier. But, you know, I am still worried about his inconsistencies as a netmiter.

He was not good tonight. Easily was the team's worst skater on the rank. Has to be better if Tristan is, if Tristan is going to be out for the next. couple weeks or something like that. Because again, it looked at he wasn't even fully trying on some of those, some of those goals against. I'm sure he was. You know, I'm not going to question, you know, saying like, oh, he was definitely not

trying. It's just, for my advantage point, it looked like, you know, he had a little more to give on some of those goalskins. But that's just me speaking. So, final segment. I think the bottom six tonight was terrific. I'm going to go into more. detail as to why they were really freaking good tonight. But before we get into that,

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All right. I'm back here in this episode of the Lockdown Penguins podcast. I am your host, Hunter Hodes. Remember to follow me on Twitter at Hunter Hodes, follow the shows, Twitter, Eleanor for Penguins. And, of course, thank you all so much for making this your first listen of the day. So tonight, it's not often you can say this. Penguins got not just one goal from the bottom six, but two.

Oh, I know, gasps. Crazy, right? I know. It happened. Tril O'Connor got one. And lo and behold. and I put a tweet out because Dan Hinen came in on a partial breakway earlier in the game.

It looked like he didn't really got much on it. One of these days, Dan Hynen is going to score again. It turns out this game was the one that he was going to score again. Finally gets his first goal since late October, his fourth goal of the season, believe it or not. In his celebration, he was fired up. You know, he did a nice little fist pump there. He was hype, to say the least.

Really nice to see Hinen get rewarding. You know, he's been on his first. healthy scratch territory for a lot of this season just because he hasn't been good. But, you know, I thought he was working hard all night, was really forechecking well, got some good looks, glad that he was able to bury that one from the side of the net. And then even Drew O'Connor, he was the one that actually made it four to four for the Penguins. Just an awesome goal for him.

You know, he was a wrecking ball behind the net, you know, really using his body to separate man the man from the puck really and also generating some solid scoring chances he is a good fourth liner decent defensive metrics as well you know he really does it all and i even put this out during the game i'll get to his goal in just a second because it almost looked like for a sack that he was not going to score on that hit the post was able to get it back banged it in the net but you know he is a perfect fourth liner for this team he does everything well defensively defensively throws his body around behind the net. No, he was knocking on the door for another goal tonight. I really like what he brings to lineup. And funny enough, you know, the underlying numbers support

it, you know, in nine minutes tonight at 55. When he was on the ice, the Penguins at 63% of the shot attempts that also had 66% of the actual goals, 77% expected goals rate, 72% scoring chances rate, and 75% high danger chances rate. He was terrific. And also, even the fourth line tonight for the most part, with Heinen, Paling, and O'Connor, when they were on the ice, 61.5% of the shot attempts for the Penguins,

two goals for, no goals against, cannot say that very often. 85% expected goals rate, 77% scoring chances, right, 75% high danger chances, right. The fourth line was terrific tonight. And when Josh Archibald is back, I am really curious to see if the fourth line can get even better because Archibald has been decent this season. Again, I will gladly eat crow on that. I didn't mind like the sign under the all season.

I didn't think he was going to do too much. He has four goals when he's healthy. And, you know, he's probably been one of the more consistent players in the bottom six when he has been light up. So based on how the fourth line did tonight, I think they would probably maybe put Hinenoff. If I have it right, if you have a fourth line that has paling Archibald and O'Connor, something like that, let them cook. You know, maybe, you know, maybe it's even a Bluger paling Archibald fourth line

because Bluger looked fine next to them early on in the season. His numbers are the kind of tank since, you know, that's also something that I think the Penguins could really work with. So, you know, the fourth line tonight was just on one, really getting some solid zone time, getting onto the dirty areas of the net, solid swan chances defensively. They really weren't really giving it back.

The third line, I thought, was okay. Jeff Carter, you know, didn't really do too much tonight. Brock McGinn. You know, he's not really doing too much right now anyway. But, you know, in terms of a fourth line, I think the Penguins could have something going there if they're able to stay healthy with it for the rest of the season. You know, that's where I really noticed tonight from Drew O'Connor.

And I do think when healthy, he is one of this team's 12-Best skaters. Does Mike Sullivan agree? I don't know when the team is healthy. Probably not. but we'll have to see you know I think there's going to be a lot of players in this lineup you know that will really be

um excuse me just fighting for their jobs you know to be awesome against and that's how I see it so really solid stuff from that forefront sign probably I think one of the best games I have seen the fourth line have all year

but there's a tremendous win for the penguins tonight there's really no way to sugar-coded it was a massive game win for this team because right now, you know, I'm checking the scoring as of late tonight right now. So you gave the Panthers a point, but you still gained another point on them. Right now, the Capitals are down three to two with four minutes left in the third period. If they lose, that is in regulation. That is big for the Penguins because they have a tiebreaker over the Capitals. And they will have three games in hand on them, plus being tied in the standings with them.

Also now five points ahead of the Islanders, two games in hand on them. three games ahead, three games in hand on the Panthers. But they're, you know, the Buffalo Sabres. They did win tonight. They beat the St. Louis Blues 5 to 3. So they had three points back to the Capitals. And the Penguins, the Sabers also have the same number of games played. So that's going to be a very interesting race.

And the Penguins right now are three points behind the Rangers. Same number of games played as well. So big win standings-wise. We'll have to see who is at practice on Wednesday. there is a chance that Josh Archibald could be ready to go for Thursday's game and that will be big for, you know, potential more bottom six score. So, again, thank you so much for listening. That will do it for this one.

Really appreciate all of you listening. I'll be back with another episode Wednesday morning, Wednesday, even though we're going to preview the game against the Capitals, go over for some practice notes. Should be a really fun game between the Penns and the Caps of D.C. The Penguins, of course, won the opening meeting this year, and also 4-1 score that Snap or 7-8-Leod Street. we'll have to see if they can get their second winner of the year against the capitals.

And then that's a cap's team that's banged up again right now. Joe No John Carlson. Tom Wilson left the game tonight. We'll have to see if he's available to go. Nicholas Bastrum is sick. T.J.O. She's away from the team, but he'll probably be able to go for that game because he's just celebrating the birth of his new kid with his wife. Congratulations to him.

But, yeah, that's all for tomorrow's episode again. Thank you so much for listening. I will speak with you all on Wednesday.