Musings: Penguins Battle Back to Extend Point Streak

Pittsburgh battled back from a 4-2 deficit to force extra time on Saturday against Columbus. While the Blue Jackets ended up winning in a shootout, the Penguins extended their point streak to five games (4-0-1). They are now 6-2-1 to start the year.

“We battled to get a point there. Unfortunately, we couldn’t get a second one,” Sidney Crosby said. “I think we feel like we’ve got another level. So, we’ve got to find it.”

The night started off well, with Ryan Shea scoring his first of the season – and second of his career – just 59 seconds into play.

He was originally drafted by Dallas, but wasn’t able to break into the NHL with their organization. The 28-year-old defenseman has done so with the Penguins, playing in over 30 games each of his first two seasons. He has had a great start to this one, picking up five points in his first nine games.

Things picked up considerably in the last five minutes, with both teams getting on the board. Anthony Mantha gave Pittsburgh a 2-1 lead with his fourth goal in the last six games with his new team – it must be the shoes his young daughter designed for him.

Arturs Silovs was busy between the pipes, facing 16 shots in the opening frame. He got some respite early in the second, when Pittsburgh’s red-hot power play went over the boards. They had scored four goals in the last two games, and nearly got another – but video review determined the puck didn’t cross the line behind Elvis Merzlikins.

“It got stuck in his armpit and I thought it was over the line,” Crosby said. “So, I think his stick ended up keeping it on the other side of the goal line. We had a couple of those that were behind him and they couldn’t find their way in unfortunately.

“But we’re making the most of our time (on the power play). We’re doing a good job of getting entries, which is big. And once we get in there, we’re not forcing a ton. Whatever’s there, we’re taking it. But for the most part there, we did a good job of taking what was given.”

The Blue Jackets scored late in the second and twice more in the first five minutes of the third before Pittsburgh started swinging the momentum back, despite losing last year’s leading goal scorer Rickard Rakell. He left the game with an upper-body injury after blocking a shot, and is being evaluated.

“I think we just started to simplify a little bit,” Rust said. “We started to put pucks in the O-zone and just try and outwork them. And I think we needed a little bit more of that effort kind of throughout the whole game.”

The last five minutes of the third belonged to the Penguins. Kris Letang, who became the 20^th defenseman in NHL history to record 600 assists in Pittsburgh’s last game, buried a slapshot from the center point on the man-advantage to make it 4-3.

“You're down two in the third period against a team that defends pretty hard. It's always hard, but we found a way to have our power play to be really good again tonight, and get a big goal,” Letang said. “So that's a positive. I think our momentum at the beginning of the game was great coming out of that gate. I thought it was pretty good. But you have to control those moments. Obviously, it's a tough league, and teams will come at you. You just need to manage those moments.”

He then earned an assist on Rust’s first of the year, which tied the game and forced overtime. The relief was written all over Rust’s face as he raised his arms in celebration.

“Obviously, he's a huge player for our team,” Letang said of Rust, who had a career-high 31 goals last season. “When he can get on the scoresheet, it's always a good thing because he’s great on both sides of the puck. He's on the PK, he's on the power play, so to have him on the scoresheet is big.”

Overtime was back and forth before Columbus won in the shootout. Here’s what Head Coach Dan Muse had to say.

Update on Rakell’s Injury: We’re still waiting for some more information, he’s still being evaluated. We’ll provide updates when we have them.

What was it like to see the team rally back? When somebody comes off the bench like that in a game, it ends up being an opportunity for other guys. It's not easy to get points in this league. We got a point. You give credit to the guys there for finding a way when we're down. I think we have to be a lot better than we played tonight, though.

Was this one of the more sloppier games so far this season? What went wrong specifically? I would say so. I thought we were on our heels, and there were some different things if you go through the game. I thought early on that it was probably more execution-based. I think we're probably trying to do the right things, but we weren't executing. Especially with just trying to get into the zone, we weren't spending a lot of time in their zone. In the second period, I thought that's when it kind of got away from us. I thought we were just putting ourselves based a little bit more on decisions there and some tough spots. And because of that, we found ourselves defending. So, I think it was a combination there.

You mentioned being back on your heels. We certainly saw that some in the second and third periods in Florida as well, even though you managed to win that game. Do you have any concerns that the overall level of play might be dropping a little bit, or are these simply correctable things that you're seeing the past two games?

I don't disagree on that in terms of (seeing it) in Florida as well. Level of concern, I mean, you look at the body of work on the year, and I've said this before – there's some big positives in terms of guys sticking with it, and you saw that again here tonight. When you have that as a base, it's good. But I think clearly, you go off a lot of this game, you go off of parts of last game, and there's been some other moments throughout the year, for sure. I think we recognize that we have work to do. I think guys been willing to put in the work, but we got to make sure that we're showing it. The consistency, if you come back over these last few games, I think we could definitely improve on that.