The cold reality of the current Pittsburgh Penguins is if they don’t all show up while getting below average goaltending they are susceptible to getting the doors blown off of them. To have it happen on night one of the season at home is certainly deflating. It is however their current reality.
The New York Rangers acted the part of a defending President’s Trophy operation. They dummied the Penguins by a score of 6-0 while outshooting them 41-29. It was a deserved result. It was one of the worst opening nights in team history
Almost every Penguins player turned in a poor performance on the opening night. This was one to forget
The nice thing for the players is they can immediately move on from a game like this as they are back in action tonight in Detroit. While it can be a good thing to move on right away and reset there is the potential with this season to have the hole get deeper. The Penguins start to this season has them playing ten games in the first 17 days, including eight games in the next 14 days. They will need to get positive results in the very near future or risk the season falling away early.
I do expect the Penguins to put forth a better showing this evening. It would be hard to do any worse. A better showing is no guarantee of victory. The Detroit Red Wings are exactly the type of team the Penguins need to defeat if they have any realistic aspirations of making the playoffs. Given that I don’t believe Pittsburgh will be able to finish above the Carolina Hurricanes, New York Rangers, or New Jersey Devils the Red Wings are one of those vying for wild card teams. They are Pittsburgh’s direct competition. Two points in early October count the same as those final games at the end of the season.
The Penguins won’t have a morning skate due to travel so we’ll see how the lines shake out later before the game. It is likely Joel Blomqvist will receive his first career start, at least he should. The team in front of either goalie will have to step it up compared to what happened against the Rangers. If not, the discourse surrounding the team is going to be quite spicy.
Thanks for reading!
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