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Penguins earn victory on Jake night

March 27, 2024, 2:55 PM ET [1 Comments]
Ryan Wilson
Pittsburgh Penguins Blogger • RSSArchiveCONTACT
The Carolina Hurricanes and Jake Guentzel came into town on Tuesday night, played extremely well, and left with 0 standings points. Alex Nedeljkovic and Sidney Crosby pushed the Penguins to a 4-1 surprise victory over one of the better teams in the NHL.

The Hurricanes had a 66.62 xGF% advantage and put up 39 shots with Nedeljkovic standing tall on 38 of them. It was a terrific performance from the Penguins netminder on a night that could have gone a lot differently if not for him.

Sidney Crosby put up another three points in the victory. Between Colorado on Sunday and Carolina last night he has seven points in his last two games. A pretty impressive feat against some prime competition. He’s at 76 points on the season and is in the driver’s seat in the race to 82. These two monster games have put something else in play that didn’t look likely a week ago. He has the opportunity with some more strong outings to finish the season inside the top ten for all-time NHL points. He’s at 1,578 at the moment and needs to get to Phil Esposito’s 1,590 to get to tenth overall. It is feasible.

Jesse Puljujarvi scored again for goals in back to back games. His skating looks to be improving from where he was when he first arrived in the organization. Finishing has never been his forte, but if there can be some improvements in this area with his hip issues on the mend it would be really helpful to the depth situation on this team. He’s on a very affordable deal. He currently has a 54.40 xGF% which is an area he has had success with in the past. Getting back to the 15ish goal mark would be a nice target for him heading into next season.

I can’t lie it is still really weird to see Jake Guentzel on a different roster and it was magnified with him back in Pittsburgh not wearing the Penguins black and gold. The team gave him a nice return video




Guentzel did not find the scoresheet against the Penguins, but he was strong all night. Had some nice tips on goal and was dominant at 5v5. He led both the Penguins and Hurricanes in xGF% last night at 93.25. He’s at 67.31 in his nine games with the Hurricanes. If he is living in the offensive zone it is only a matter of time before tangible offense will follow. Nedeljkovic was the main reason there wasn’t.

Who did Guentzel play against the most last night? His former center. Up against Sidney Crosby he was CF 19 CA 8 for a CF% of 70.37 and an xGF% of 88.01

After the game Jake had quite the quote


This pretty much confirms the speculation that the Penguins front office was never serious about bringing him back. There are arguments to be had for signing or trading him, but this puts to rest that he wasn’t willing to stay in Pittsburgh. They never came to him with an authentic offer thus leading to his departure. I’m not personally a big fan of how this played out. I don’t know how you can “retool” and not rebuild when you voluntarily give away such an important piece to the team’s offensive success. Given the quote I can’t imagine it is likely to see him come back as a free agent in July. For the people who are holding out hope for such a result I would temper your expectations there.

Guentzel wasn’t the only former Stanley Cup winning Penguin on the ice last night for Carolina. Jordan Staal had himself quite a game. He finished with an xGF% of 92.27. Given how dominant Carolina was with multiple lines the Penguins were pretty fortunate to get the result they did.

Up next for the Penguins are the Columbus Blue Jackets in a home and home happening on Thursday and Saturday. How many points can Sid get? Where in the standings will the Penguins be after these two games?

Thanks for reading!
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