Musings: Penguins Let Another Game Slip Away Late

In the final minutes of regulation on Saturday against San Jose, Bryan Rust hit the post while going for the empty net with the Penguins holding a 5-3 lead.

It was a fortuitous bounce for the Sharks, who promptly went the other way and completed the comeback. San Jose scored five unanswered goals after Anthony Mantha gave Pittsburgh a 5-1 lead at the 5:25 mark of the third period, rallying for a 6-5 overtime win.

When asked if he could describe what unfolded, Erik Karlsson said, “I don’t know. I think there’s a lot more inappropriate words for how this game unfolded.

“Again, we play an unbelievable game up until 15 minutes left or so in the third, I think. Then we start going through the motions, trying to kill time, and this league is too good for that, no matter who you play. We paid for it today.”

After a stretch where the Penguins won four of five, they have been on the wrong end of the result in four straight. In three of those games, they surrendered leads late.

“Three of the four, we felt like we did everything but get two points. That’s the unfortunate part of it,” Sidney Crosby said. “We’ve got to find a way to be consistent. We’ve done a lot of good things here in the first 30 games. We’ve got to find a way to close out games.”

In terms of how they keep from gripping their sticks too tightly in those situations, Rust said simply, “You just can’t.”

“We’re pros, we’ve got to get the job done,” he continued. “I think you’ve just got to play harder and simplify. I think just get the puck out of the zone and make sure that everyone is doing their job.”

There were a lot of positives up until that point. Pittsburgh dominated possession, finishing with 43 shots. They got depth scoring, with players from every line contributing offensively. The power play scored three goals. Arturs Silovs had made some big stops, including turning aside two breakaways.

But no one in that dressing room really wanted to talk about them, understandably so.

“This shouldn't be the conversation. It's too many games in a row that's happening,” Dan Muse said.

Here’s the rest of what the Penguins Head Coach had to say after the game.

Obviously, the third period wasn’t acceptable. From your point of view, why does this keep happening and what can you do to fix it? You can go back, not just this recent stretch, but other games over the year, obviously we have to be better at those kinds of games. That doesn't need to be stated. I think it's something different every time. I don't think it's always the exact same thing. The common thread is we play one way the great the majority of the game. Then sometimes, it's a one-goal lead, two-goal lead, like it's been different situations. The common thread is that we get away from what works. Sometimes, it's a little structurally. We get away from what works. Sometimes, we just put ourselves in bad positions. Sometimes, we take in poor penalties at inopportune times, giving them momentum, and we haven't done nearly a good enough job of gaining that momentum back. We then look like a different team. I'll take responsibility for this, too. Believe me, it's all of us. We have to be better with it on the ice. I have to clearly be better, because it's happened a number of times now. And we'll find a way to. It’s just costing us too many points already, and obviously, it has to stop. And there's not one thing other than the way we fall away from what works at those critical points.

Was there one thing in particular that went wrong in the third period? I mean, positionally, I don't think it's something that they changed. They look to stretch out. They look to get behind you. They look to create space off of that. In that situation, you got to keep playing both sides of the puck. You've got to work to make them defend still. You got to work to continue to get chances. But you also have to know that they're going to try to do everything that they can. They're not going away, they're going to look to score, they're probably going to take even more risk. You have to have awareness in that. You have to be disciplined. Then we have to be clearly better in those end-of-the-game situations, 5-on-6. There are multiple parts to that. It's not just what you see in terms of chances against, goals against, the way we play it. It’s continuing to work on it, continuing to address it. There's no question in my mind that this group can be much better than we are. We have to get there, though. We have to be working with them. And so, like I said, it's happened enough times, too. I'll look in the mirror first.

Was Silovs good enough tonight, or was he a victim of how the team played in front of him? You go throughout the game there, we had breakdowns, and he had to come up with some big saves. At the end of the game, I think everybody was playing on their heels. They gave him some really good looks there in those situations. It shouldn’t happen.

What’s not connecting with the team in terms of their 5-on-6 play? If you go back a few games, I thought it was kind of one part. I thought it was just allowing them to get in. You got to be better there structurally, the detail behind it. They have an extra attacker, but you can definitely limit the types of chances that you're giving them. And we gave them some real good looks there tonight. You also have to be in a position to end the game. When you have opportunities there, to be able to get it out or get it to set yourself up there to have a chance at the empty net. We had a chance at it, and it hits the post, like that's going to happen, but just the way you come out of the zone – there’s multiple parts to it. We're going to continue to look at it. We're going to continue to work with the players. We'll continue to evaluate if we need to look at other ways of doing it, and we have to be better.”