After an eventful overtime win on Wednesday against Buffalo that marked two huge milestones for Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin, the Penguins experienced a bit of an energy letdown on Friday versus Carolina. The Hurricanes came away with a 4-1 win at PPG Paints Arena.
“I don’t have a good explanation. We should have plenty of energy and will to play in front of our fans this early in the season in a divisional game,” Lars Eller said.
“We just got to look inward; everybody has got to look inward and bring a little bit more. Everybody can be a leader and drag us into a game, whether it’s a goal, a hit, or something. We need to find a way to drag ourselves into the game when we’re not emotionally there. We should be emotionally there, but I don’t think we were today.”
Pittsburgh actually opened the scoring in the first period, with Drew O’Connor getting his second in as many games in the first period.
“He’s just growing and growing. He’s a very versatile player,” said Eller, who’s played with the 26-year-old forward for most of this young season. “He makes our team better, is a great penalty killer, can play up and down the lineup, and contributes with more and more offense. We’re glad to have him.”
But the Hurricanes responded just over a minute later, and didn’t look back. The Penguins hosted an opponent with dangerous special teams units last season, as Carolina ranked second on the power play and third on the penalty kill.
The Hurricanes won that battle, converting twice on the man-advantage for their next two tallies. One of those came on a double minor for high sticking assessed to Michael Bunting at the end of the second. Meanwhile, the Penguins went 0-for-5 on the power play.
“That doesn’t help us, but I think it starts in our 5-on-5 game today,” Eller said. “There are so many things that need to be better, the attitude, the energy, the execution. If those things are better, then we aren’t probably playing as much shorthanded. We put ourselves in bad spots all the time. Hopefully, we won’t see another game like this. We just dug ourselves a deep hole, too much to get out of.”
After playing well in relief in Wednesday’s 6-5 overtime win over Buffalo, Joel Blomqvist made the third start of his NHL career (and fourth overall appearance). The 22-year-old rookie faced 39 shots on the night.
“They're a fast team. You need to be alert all the time,” Blomqvist said. “They're a team with a lot of skill.”
“I thought he competed hard,” Mike Sullivan said. “He made some big saves. They had a fair amount of zone time in our end, so he was forced to have to make some big saves. I thought he competed hard all night.”
With Alex Nedeljkovic (lower body) on a conditioning stint in Wilkes-Barre/Scranton, Tristan Jarry served as the backup. He was pulled the other night after surrendering three goals on five shots. Sullivan said that while obviously, they don’t have the two-time NHL All-Star’s best game right now, part of their responsibility is to help the goaltender find it.
“The season's young, it's early, and we're going to do our best as a coaching staff to try to help Jars get to his very best game,” he said. “When Jars is at his best, he's a very high-quality goaltender. He makes the timely saves that give us a chance to win. It hasn't been the greatest start from a performance standpoint yet, but we believe in Jars and his ability to be a quality goalie in this league.”
The Penguins are now 3-3 on the season, with Sullivan saying, “I think we are where we’re at. I think we probably played three decent games. We probably played three games that don't live up to our expectations. Let's just say it that way. So, for me, we have to have higher expectations of ourselves.”
Next up for the Penguins is a four-game road trip north of the border. It starts in Winnipeg on Sunday before going through western Canada (Calgary, Edmonton, Vancouver).
