Kovacevic: Finally, Penguins' 'reload' is revived

Oct 27, 2017 • 12:30 am

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The term the Penguins use internally is 'reload.'

And the most obvious application of the term, within the context of taking down the Jets, 2-1, in overtime Thursday night at PPG Paints Arena would be this:

Yep, Phil Kessel scored on an OT breakaway Tuesday against the Oilers, also a 2-1 final.

The man then reloaded and scored on another OT breakaway Thursday.

"Sometimes you get lucky," the city's next mayor would say. "Two breakaways in overtime ... I'm fortunate to get those in."

That, to be sure, was what brought 18,445 fans from their seats, not to mention Phil's 300th goal and the spotlight as the evening's official No. 2 star, followed by Matt Murray's richly merited No. 1 star for 30 saves, several of them spectacular.

But none of that is the 'reload' concept. And none of that, at the risk of popping balloons regarding those two performances, is anywhere near as important as the 'reload' concept.

As proof positive, when I began to ask Murray after this game if his team had finally begun to ... well, let's just say he didn't need to hear the rest of the question.

"Oh, God, yeah, and it's awesome," he interjected. "I mean, look at these last couple of games and you can see it all over the ice, shift after shift."

Let me rewind before explaining 'reload.'

The Penguins got annihilated by the Lightning six days ago, and I'm betting the 7-1 score is still seared onto your plasma screen. Well, know that it's also been seared into the participants' brains. Several players told me before and after this outcome that Mike Sullivan and staff let all concerned have it.

The focus was the 'reload.' And this is what that means, in two simple points:

1. Manage the puck.

That's a Sully-ism, and it might be the king in that category. He has certain sections of ice where he and the staff repeatedly urge players -- even Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin -- to exercise extra caution. When in doubt, when no play is readily evident, move the puck into a safe space and, ideally, continue to pursue it. But, in general, don't just fling it through the middle and hope.

2. If you lose it, 'reload.'

I'll turn it over to Jacques Martin for this one, per our conversation after the game: "Flip a switch. All five guys. Everybody on the ice moves into the right position, get on the right side of the puck. And it's everybody, I'll say it again. Not just the defensemen. In our system, the forwards have just as much responsibility preventing goals as the defensemen. It's so, so important that we all do that and that we all do it at the same time. All of us come back. All of us support on the rush. That makes everybody's job so much easier."

A pristine example from the first period Thursday:

That's the Jets' No. 2 line of Bryan Little, Patrik Laine and Nikolaj Ehlers rushing through the neutral zone. Laine’s got the puck, and Little is off to his left. He's the wild card, because if no one claims him, all kinds of options open.

As it is, Laine’s got nada. Olli Maatta and Chad Ruhwedel see that Crosby's got Little, so they can stay tight to one side of the ice and keep tight gaps on Laine and Ehlers. So tight that Laine has no choice but to softly flip to the right corner.

But it's not done. Once the flip is made, Crosby, who gets more license than most, briefly abandons Little in the event that Ruhwedel beats Ehlers to the puck, so that he can be behind Murray's net for an easy outlet. Ehlers is fast, too, so he wins the race, but Crosby's in easy position to recover in front. And though they're out of the above frame, Winnipeg's defensemen are marked by the trailing forwards, as well.

Simple stuff, right?

Well, then, why weren't the Penguins doing it before the past couple games, even in their victories?

Stanley Cup hangover?

Some uncharacteristic hubris?

Seeing Kris Letang back there and figuring there was no need?

Whatever the case, it seems to be sorted out and properly prioritized, just in time to pack up a 7-3-1 start for this five-game road trip that begins Saturday and carries across Western Canada.

"Yeah, we've kind of taken our time a little bit," Ruhwedel was telling me with a small smile after this game. "But over this whole week, I think, we've really gotten so much more consistent with the work we've put in all over the rink. Tampa was a gutcheck for us, no question. We talked as a team, we talked amongst ourselves, and we knew we had a lot more in us."

He motioned around the room in the direction of a couple of the forwards.

"Everybody's back. Everybody's helping. And that's what changes everything. For us, as defensemen, it allows us to keep a really good gap. It makes it hard for the other team to move through the neutral zone. It helps us all break out easier. Helps the transition. Everything just mingles."

"I think at the beginning of the season you're always trying to find your identity a little bit, and we do have some new guys here," Ryan Reaves, one of those new guys, told me. "But I think we're really starting to hammer that out a little bit these past couple games. We're really committing."

That won't show everywhere. The Oilers registered 30 shots on Murray but also totaled 65 attempted shots, including those that missed or were blocked. That's one per minute, and it's indicative of the pressure applied by Connor McDavid and his mates. The Jets, blessed with even more size, skill and speed up front than Edmonton, registered 31 shots on Murray and totaled 54 attempts.

Paul Maurice, Winnipeg's coach, summed it up with trademark clarity.

"It was a funny game," he said. "It looked like both teams were very close to generating an awful lot of offense that either never got to the net or missed the net. It was unusual."

Right. But for the purposes of this discussion, it's yet another sign that the Jets came hard and the Penguins came back to minimize the quality of the actual chance.

Ask the man behind the mask, and he'll tell you it's night and day from Tampa Bay.

"Not even close," Murray said. "These are two really fast, talented teams we just faced, and they both came at us hard. I know there were some good chances they had, but that's going to happen when you go against someone like that. Our guys were back and skating hard the whole way through both games. It was great to see."

It was easy to detect from Murray's demeanor that he was outright delighted by this, and that's not commonly seen from the most even-keeled dude in the room.

"Hey, this is when we're at our best, when we're playing like this. And to do this now, before we go on this trip ... it's pretty cool. This was nice."

MATT SUNDAY GALLERY

Penguins vs. Jets, PPG Paints Arena, Oct. 26, 2017. - MATT SUNDAY / DKPS

WHAT'S BREWING?

• There's no Friday Insider this week. That's my fault. I did a poor job of organizing/planning it, and I'll be much, much better for the next edition.

• The increasingly popular Favorites and Likes, by Taylor Haase, collects the week's best in social media from around Pittsburgh sports. Also, something about a bike.

• This will be my last day at home for quite a while. Going to try to take it a little easy, at least after a couple of afternoon business meetings.

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