It takes one before you can get to two. The Pittsburgh Penguins earned their first victory in the playoffs in three years when they defeated the Philadelphia Flyers 4-2 on Saturday night. The game still had playoff intensity, but it was a much quieter affair than the previous three games. Something that benefitted the Penguins.
While Pittsburgh still didn’t play a complete game they did simplify and for the most part stay out of the garbage. They were less distracted from the drama. Instead of the Flyers taking advantage of egregious mistakes the Penguins made,w it was Pittsburgh on the other end of some Dan Vladar mishaps.
The series is still overwhelmingly in the Flyers control. However, if the Penguins were to win Game 5, things will get interesting. I have a feeling the confidence and looseness the Flyers have played with gets turned on its head with the existence of Game 6. The Penguins need to flip the script and force the Flyers to play with those negative feelings.
Lineup changes
When you’re down 0-3 it can’t hurt anything to try something new. Dan Muse went with a new approach in Game 4 and I liked the choices he made. The first choice was to pull out Stuart Skinner, who let in two soft goals in Game 3, for Arturs Silovs. I do think Skinner made some difficult saves over the course of his three starts, but he isn’t going to carry a team to victory. It was fine to give Silovs some action and Silovs rewarded Muse with a .933 save percentage.
Additionally, Muse benched Connor Clifton. This was long overdue. Idon’t think Clifton is a good player. I do not like his style and find his physicality wildly overrated. More times than not his physicality leads to him chasing and giving the other team more time and space than when the play started. His physicality did nothing to help a team that was in the middle of playing highly physical games. If it doesn’t help then, then when is it going to help?
I’ve wondered what the deal was with Ilya Solovyov given his extended time in the press box. For some reason he just never got traction with the regular lineup. I think his skill set is better served to get the Penguins doing the things they need to do. They are an offensive team and having players who can help facilitate breakouts and transition is going to help them more than dime store Brooks Orpik.
Justin Brazeau had an opportunity to play in Game 3 and he was fine. It’s just that Soderblom’s motor and size is a better fit for what the Penguins needs right now. Brazeau is a lumbering player who can make things happen when there is a sustained attack in the offensive zone. There hasn’t been a sustained attack and Brazeau doesn’t have the skillset to create it. Thus, Soderblom being a more effective option. I like getting the big gallon of glue back out there.
Not good enough
Anthony Mantha continues to be a huge disappointment in this series. He has no points and has taken a penalty in every game so far. He has 18 penalty minutes in this series. You can still be effective out there without points, but this is not one of those scenarios. Mantha is not creating or impacting the play in a positive way at all. His over the glass penalty was a crushing blow the other night.
Last night, when the Penguins were navigating a drama free effective first period he took a very needless offensive zone holding penalty. This puts the team on their heels at a time there was absolutely no reason for it.
You could probably insert Kevin Hayes into Mantha’s spot in the lineup right now and not notice a difference. That’s how bad Mantha has been in this series.
Blake Lizotte had a really nice regular season. When he was out long term the team definitely felt his absence, especially on the penalty kill. So far in this series he has been a net negative. He has missed the net on a few occasions with one of those feeding the Flyers transition the other way for a goal. He has also started their transition with questionable passes towards the top of the offensive zone. In Game 4 he took a stupid post whistle roughing penalty with the Penguins trying to hold a lead in an elimination game.
What I need from the fourth line players is to know their role and stay within it. Go out there do your job and get off the ice without leaving your team in a worse spot than you found it. Ultimately, the fourth line’s job is to give rest to the other players who can do more with the puck than they can. It isn’t to make bad choices with the puck and take dumb penalties. And with Lizotte, you’re supposed to be the guy killing the penalty.
I realize the power play kicked off the scoring last night. However, it was a mess the rest of the way and has been for most of the series. The goal wasn’t because the power play setup was effective. The goal came five seconds after Sidney Crosby won a faceoff and the result of a ridiculous feed and one timer shot by Erik Karlsson and Crosby.
I mean, look at this. Two guys who are just amazing at what they do.
Karlsson puts the perfect weight on the puck and Sid catches it pure from the unique angle the puck came from. It isn’t too surprising it caught Vladar off guard. How many times does a goalie get a look like that off the draw?
Back to the terrible power play setup, though. The power play needs to use the entire zone. The Penguins refuse to work the power play from down low. It allows Philadelphia to cheat up high. Crosby and Karlsson are playing basic catch back and forth up top and then trying to thread low percentage passes east to west. It is lazy, , it is uninspired, and it is the worst thing a power play can be, predictable.
A bad power play with uninspired choices just allows the other team to feel good about themselves to push hard right after it. You don’t have to score on the power play (even if that is obviously the #1 goal) for it to be effective.
It is damning when you have a two goal lead late and the power play can’t even be bothered to look mildly dangerous. The fact the other team feels empowered to make a push after the power play is damning. A good power play in the third period of an important playoff game will make the other team feel lucky they even survived it, not catapult them to score a goal of their own after it. There’s too much talent on the ice for that to happen on a regular basis.
The Penguins will get to defend home ice on Monday. If they can focus on the action between the whistles and not distract themselves from doing the things they are supposed to do they cna buy themselves more time. It would make for a very interesting Game 6 on Wednesday in Philadelphia. For now, they just need to get through Monday.
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