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You have three zipper games in the first round?
Hey, anything can happen in the playoffs of the Stanley Cup. The situation of the Penguins now, following their 4-1 The loss to the Islanders in Sunday's third game at the PPG Paints Arena hits several teams each spring.
Sidney Crosby and Jake Guentzel without any goal?
OK, they are human. "You have to find a way to score goals in this time of year," Crosby said. "It's not easy, but you have to find a way." And in the case of Guentzel, he suffered an injury that would normally prevent him from returning.
Matt Murray have jumped twice just after his team takes the lead?
This is not ideal either. "We just have to keep moving forward," he said. "It's all we can do." But they would not be in the tournament without him, and otherwise he's fine.
Justin Schultz to hang inexplicably on the second of these New York goals, even if the attackers changed on the fly?
As he said: "It's a bad game on my part."
Mike Sullivan out of play, on and off the ice, by Barry Trotz?
One goal, of a fourth-line winger, after another match of a whole goal, a third-pair defender?
Four complete shots on 5:16 of power play time?
Twice as many gifts as the Islanders, 16-8?
To be burned at each race Tom Kuhnhackl?
The Pittsburgh crowd being show by the Long Island crowd?
This list could lengthen, much more time than these 10, and yes, I'm sure I can create a bonus slot for the mere existence of a civic scapegoat. Dominik Simon. But the coldest fact of this almost icy corpus so far is that the list of people involved in the Penguins who were too successful in this task could be condensed … maybe Erik Gudbranson?
My God, that might not be a hyperbole.
When a team I cover works well, I will dig and dig to find out why. When this team does not behave well, I will also ask participants on both sides, I will immerse myself in old and new statistical models, and I will end up with a good representation of what went wrong. . And the only thing that hardly ever arises, especially in the playoffs, is effort.
Not this time. Not after this game.
Because, being honest, these guys do not care. Not far enough anyway.
I could live with both defeats on Long Island. They tried there. They fought. They bled. They fought one for the other. They skated with enough enthusiasm to carve this ice marbled from back and forth.
Right here?
Look at this. Seriously, just look at:
It's 50 seconds freaking of the legendary fourth line of New York Casey Cizikas, Matt Martin and Cal Clutterbuck, take five penguins. That's right: it's three to five. Because Trotz never allows his supporters to pinch himself. They are so far in this sequence that they have barely been spotted. And yet, in 50 seconds, there is not a strong double team on Cizikas, Martin or Clutterbuck. Or a simple check of the seal to allow a teammate to pick up the puck. Or a simple smart slide to remove one of two pass options.
Look at it another time. This time, just black sweaters. Consider the clock. Consider the situation: two goals in what is essentially a game of elimination, then watch what they do.
How did it happen?
Rewind the Penguins by jumping on them From Garrett Wilson point. The place was jumping for the first and only time, the opponent was put in his first uncomfortable position of the series, which allowed him to follow a half-minute later:
That was not inspired by everyone, and do not let the coach go astray: just after his fourth row earned him a big goal and a rare lead, Sullivan sent a line on the board. from Crosby between Phil Kessel and Zach Aston-Reese. And if that sounds unfamiliar to you, it's because these three people shared an ice surface for 3 minutes and 28 seconds throughout the season.
Super time to see what they can do.
Imagine the effect that Jordan Eberle Snipe had on the bench, as I raised with Wilson:
Regardless of the Islanders' effect of adding 62 seconds later:
See what Brock Nelson and Kuhnhackl did it in Crosby in the New York area?
Hm. They doubled it. S introduced them as they wanted and flew in the other direction.
See what Schultz did on that side, trying to push Kuhnhackl even as Nelson and Josh Bailey whistled by?
Ugh. The borderline between effort and concentration is blurred in a sport as fast as hockey. Focusing is l & # 39; effort. And when the coach continually preaches on the moment of pinching and reversing, and this happens … it's downright not trying hard enough.
One more:
I hate this one so much, if only because it's as ugly and dreary as hockey. But then, it takes two. The Penguins had clear and unhindered possession emerging from their area. Brian Dumoulin There were still not many options at the point of sale, with the Islanders fooling four on their blue line, but there's another stride to go through, a second or two where somebody is going to go. one can open, another body or two that he can pull his way for a smarter chip behind New York's defense.
Instead … that was it. Flat like a Pamela pancake, and boomerang in the red center.
Heck, just isolate on Aston-Reese by going down the right wing, somehow doubling on the front check with Nick Bjugstad, kind of peel for Robin Lehner predictable envelope around the boards, but kind of do no.
It's effort, concentration or a hockey hybrid of the two.
Worse than all of the above, at least from my point of view, was this: how did this group, most of them still a few years from the Cup, find the necessary awareness to travel the last 15 minutes of this match? an extreme that even overcrowded islanders have finally slowed down themselves, probably out of pity?
It was a two-goal difference for screaming hard, but it looked like a pre-season at every point of the rink: no hard skate stops. No sprays near the fold. No boots. No crisp. No hard drives on neutral areas, at least none that I have detected, until 3:52 remains in regulation.
As a former front-office member observed it for me afterwards, "I could not believe it, nothing, we did not do anything."
It's embarrassing.
It was a playoff game. A critic. And his result was largely determined by a disparity of effort. For this franchise, with all that is achieved, with Mario Lemieux Looking in front of one's own paying followers, it's embarrassing.
Or at least that should have been it. But I did not detect anything like that in a locker room that seemed soaked with denial.
I asked Kris Letang if the Penguins were flat: "No, I think we had our chances, in the second half we could have taken the advantage, the goalkeeper made some nice stops, and it's hard to play. hockey when one is set back from a goal, or down two when they play a style like that ".
A similar question was asked to Kessel about whether the collective effort was there: "Yeah, I mean, we all care, we all want to win, we'll just try to get the next one and keep going. of the."
Trying would be a rough start.
It was like it was a meaningless Monday night against Minnesota.
The same goes for Sullivan, who is ultimately responsible for the efforts and focus of his team. He was always candid when he criticized one or the other of these aspects, but he felt he did not know what he thought he knew if his players were interested in it: "Uh, I I'm not sure I have the answer Our guys They worry They want to win And they understand what is needed So I will not stay here and say they do not buy. sometimes a game of mistakes, we just have to do a better job of limiting some of the things we make, that's all. "
If only.
I do not understand this group. I do not do it.
They care. All. Sullivan as much as anyone. But there is something wrong with these Penguins since the opening night and I can not help but wonder if there was not enough comfort, complacency for too long. Throughout this strange winter, they simply reversed the switch when they felt like it, and everything was great.
Well, the other team does not care and does not have to start making it suddenly.
Hours before the clash, Sullivan bristled after being questioned about the Penguins' level of despair: "I'm not sure I love that word because it involves a certain level of desperation. I speak a lot because I do not think it is the state of mind we need. "
And now?
MATT SUNDAY GALLERY
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