1. Workflow
The team made changes to their defense pairings, with Brian Dumoulin and Kris Letang the only tandem staying intact. John Marino was reunited with Marcus Pettersson, while Chad Ruhwedel - who was a healthy scratch for Game 1 - skated alongside Mike Matheson. Cody Ceci skated on the fourth pairing with Juuso Riikola.
Guentzel-Crosby-Rodrigues
Zucker-Malkin-Rust
McCann-Jankowski-Tanev
Lafferty-Blueger-Sceviour
Dumoulin-Letang
Pettersson-Marino
Matheson-Ruhwedel
Riikola-Ceci
Penguins head coach Mike Sullivan confirmed that Tristan Jarry will start in goal.
2. Defensive depth
When discussing the makeup of Pittsburgh's blue line, Sullivan said that regardless of the personnel they go with, they are looking for pairs that are complimentary of one another that give them a solid group of six.
"We are looking for combinations that allow us to cast them in certain roles and bring different things to the table," Sullivan said. "So, regardless of what those pairs look like tonight, that's what we're looking for."
That being said, the Penguins feel fortunate to have defensive depth where they can rely on steady, capable players like Ruhwedel throughout the course of a season.
"We have eight defensemen on our active roster that we believe are capable of helping us win games on any given night, and we'll make those decisions on a game-by-game basis," Sullivan said.
Moving forward into the season, it's a matter of those eight defensemen coming together as a group, building chemistry and getting on the same page. And Kris Letang is doing the best he can to facilitate that as one of the Penguins' core leaders and franchise defenseman.
"Obviously we have a lot of new faces and we have a new system and different things that we have all to learn," Letang said. "I'm trying to help them out with different things that we've done in the past and that we're still doing up to this day. We have a lot of talented guys. All the guys that are in our dressing room can skate and make plays, so we're pretty fortunate to have eight defensemen that are really good and NHL caliber."
3. PK focusing on net-front
After allowing Philadelphia to go 2-for-3 on the man-advantage in Wednesday's 6-3 loss, the penalty killers went to work in the video room ahead of tonight's rematch.
"We've gone over it like we would after any game when something like that happens," forward Teddy Blueger said. "There's always things we can improve and some positive things we can learn on, but I think as far as what went wrong, just a couple of breakdowns, miscommunications. Obviously, their goals were pretty similar and happened on not the same play. So we definitely addressed that."
Both goals were scored through screens off point shots from Flyers defenseman Erik Gustafsson, and Letang said the focus heading into tonight is clearing the crease so that Jarry can see those pucks.
"The aspect that (needs work) was the net front," Letang said. "There were shots that usually, if there's no tip or no screen, it's an easy save for a goalie. So I think as defensemen, we have to be better in front of our net."
