Mike Sullivan felt like his team didn’t have a lot of juice on Wednesday night in Montreal, which was the second half of a back-to-back, but they battled hard and fought back for a shootout victory.
The Penguins failed to display that same sort of resilience and compete on Saturday evening in Toronto, with their slow start snowballing into a 7-0 defeat against the Maple Leafs.
“It's a long year, you play 82 games, you're not going to feel very good all of those nights. When you don't, you got to find a way to bring something,” Erik Karlsson said. “We can't just be satisfied with being out there. We still got to contribute, whether that's with the puck or without the puck, and today, we didn't do that consistently throughout the lineup, and it started right away. So, it was a tough night for us, obviously.”
Auston Matthews, who leads the NHL with 23 goals in 27 games, was a late scratch due to illness. But the rest of the Leafs stepped up in his absence, building a 3-0 in the first period of play. Top-line forwards Matthew Knies and Mitch Marner got on the board, and Bobby McMahon scored the first goal of his NHL career.
The Leafs tallied again early in the second, which led to Alex Nedeljkovic replacing Tristan Jarry between the pipes. After that, the Penguins got into some penalty trouble, with Kris Letang taking a holding minor to prevent a scoring chance, and getting assessed a 10-minute minor after the whistle blew.
Toronto converted that power play just 20 seconds in, and got another one on the man-advantage later in the period. Pittsburgh’s penalty kill, currently missing three of its top four players with Bryan Rust (upper body), Noel Acciari (lower body), and Matt Nieto (lower body) all sidelined, is experiencing some ups and downs. They scored a shorthanded goal along with two crucial kills late in regulation and in overtime on Wednesday, but also surrendered a tally.
While they gave up another two tonight, that wasn’t the biggest issue on a night that was pretty chippy on both sides. Overall, the Penguins just made everything far too easy for a team that possesses so much talent and skill throughout their lineup, even without their best player.
“I mean, you can’t chase the game against them,” Sidney Crosby said. “You give them room and open up, and you’re going to pay. So, I thought we got behind there and then tried to force things to get back in it, and that’s what happens.”
They flew back to Pittsburgh after the game and are scheduled to practice on Sunday before hosting the Minnesota Wild on Monday. Here’s what Head Coach Mike Sullivan had to say after the game.
Feels like there wasn’t a lot to like about this game. Is there any facet you found especially troubling? “No, we just didn’t play very well.”
When you switched the goalies, was that a matter of Jarry’s performance, or were you looking to add a spark? “A little bit of both.”
What do you say after a game like this? Do you just flush it or do you really dissect it? “Well, I’ll certainly dissect it. I'm not sure quite yet how I'll respond to it. You know, it's a humbling experience. We didn't perform to our expectations, and it's disappointing. We're all in this thing together. We got to figure it out.”
Lars Eller said there wasn't a willingness to play defense as a team. Is that a fair assessment? Do you agree with that? “Yeah.”
