Kovacevic: Holtby over Murray biggest divide so far

Tom Wilson's hoarding all the headlines, and Alexander Ovechkin holds the upper hand among the superstars, but nothing's defined this Stanley Cup playoff series like the disparity in goaltending.

Wait, wait, don't give up on this column yet.

Yeah, I know, that's generally the lowest common denominator of hockey discussion, and that might be doubly the case when the numbers aren't that different: Matt Murray's given up nine goals on 87 shots for the Penguins, Braden Holtby seven goals on 70 shots for the Capitals. That's an .897 save percentage for the former, .900 for the latter.

But dig a bit deeper into the quality of the goals, and it crystallizes quickly.

Start with this: Eight of the Capitals' nine goals on Murray have gone to the glove side.

If that were new to this series, it'd be a dismissible coincidence. But it isn't. It's been going on, in stretches, since his arrival in the NHL, and it's now in full bloom. Other than John Carlson's power-play one-timer in the first period of this Game 3 -- which went blocker side and was accidentally tipped by Bryan Rust -- every single goal has been elevated on the same side.

And none was uglier than this tying slap shot by Matt Niskanen early in the third period:

That goal can't happen in that situation. No real screen upon release. Not all that much zip. Still overpowers him.

"There was a bit of a fly-by screen, and I was a little late picking it up," Murray would explain. "I got a piece of it. Just tricked in."

Asked if he felt the Capitals are targeting his glove, he ... well, he might have misheard or misunderstood the question, but he replied, "Yeah, they're coming at you in waves. They're getting a lot off the rush. You've just got to take it as it comes."

Mike Sullivan was asked much the same.

"No," came the initial answer followed by a long pause. "No, look, when you look at the way goaltenders play the position in today's game, there are a lot of butterfly-style goaltenders, so when goaltenders butterfly, there are certain areas of the net that tend to get exposed. And usually under the crossbar is one of them, so ... you know, our guys try to do the same thing. I just think that's the style of most of the goaltenders in the league in today's game."

OK, so he didn't want to answer it, either. And that's pretty much par for hockey culture. You can criticize anything and anyone, but not goaltending.

Well, nothing's stopping me, so I'll come right out and say it: Murray hasn't been good enough,.

I felt -- strongly -- that he'd found himself in Games 3 and 4 in Philadelphia. It's as sharp as I'd seen him, especially in his leg-pad movement and east-west economy of motion. He also was swallowing up rebounds and, yeah, the glove was fine, too. He showed some of that in Game 1 of this series, as well.

But from the start of Game 2 when Ovechkin put that long-range wrister by the glove 1:26 after the opening draw, he's looked guarded, uncertain and particularly wobbly on long shots. Even those he saves have leaked through him at times.

At the other end, Holtby has come through consistently with the big save, but more telling, I think, is the type of goal he's given up: Of the Penguins' seven goals, three have come on deflections, including this one by Jake Guentzel in the first period of this game ...

... while two others were slam dunks, another through a point flick two-man screen and the other on a Sidney Crosby one-timer through the five-hole.

Goaltenders can sleep after those kinds of goals.

"I just think we've all been playing well, pushing hard," Holtby said of the Capitals as a whole. "This wasn't an easy game for anyone to get anything through."

He's right: 22 shots each. Makes stopping them all the more pivotal.

• The Penguins have the better roster. They should win this series. I believe they will in seven, as I wrote at the outset. But I'll toss that right out on the heap if one or both of the above don't change.

• Check out Justin Schultz's lateral skating on that Guentzel goal up there, back and forth across the blue line until he got the look he wanted. Registered four shots. Skated with authority. Performed like a No. 1 defenseman. Might have been his best game of the playoffs.

• Phil Kessel needs to be back with Evgeni Malkin.

I was already hearing this might be the case for Game 4, though we'll have to wait and see. What's already known now is that Kessel's struggles are very real: His power-play assist in this game was his first point of the series. He's additionally contributed all of four shots, and he's had six others blocked.

The latter has been a serious bug, even with his passing which had been impeccable as recently as a month ago.

Injury?

Obviously, yeah, he's playing hurt, likely with the same wrist that's been nagging him for weeks now.

But this isn't optional for a change, either. It's got to happen. And the best way for that is to reunite him with Malkin, as both feed off each other. Sullivan loves the concept of multiple lines as scoring threats, but the only consistent push from any line remains Crosby's, and that won't cut it. At the very worst, Sullivan could have two lines humming rather than one.

"I had a conversation with Phil this morning," Sullivan said. "We just tried to talk about his game. We tried to share our observations and insights as a coaching staff. We just talked about moving his feet, getting closer to the puck, coming across the ice, trying to play in the traffic a little bit. It's that type of series. There's not a lot of ice out there. We tried to offer some insights that might help him. And we'll try to surround him with some people who might help him."

That began during the game with several shifts alongside Derick Brassard and Conor Sheary. Those went mostly well, but I'm not thinking that'll be the solution.

"We'll sit down as a coaching staff," Sullivan said, "and see if we can put together some combinations that might help."

• Malkin and Brian Dumoulin were both strong in their returns, with Malkin illustrating his unique value to a power-play with this slick setup for Patric Hornqvist in the second:

Seriously, he abandoned the left point on a slow-developing give-and-go with Kessel, then worked from the goal line as if it were all part of some natural progression.

Imagine scheming to play short-handed against that. There's no counter.

• The injury to Zach Aston-Reese -- broken jaw requiring surgery, plus a concussion -- sounds like it could keep him out for the playoffs, and I posit that entirely because it's so out of character for Sullivan to announce anything injury-related this time of year. When that happens, here and with most NHL teams, it's because coaches aren't concerned it can be used against the player when he returns.

I was about to suggest that the real shame is that he was just having maybe his best performance of the playoffs, but no, the real shame is that jaw surgery can be a torturous affair, followed by days or weeks of sucking down liquid food through straws.

Here's hoping for a smooth recovery. Good kid.

• Daniel Sprong for Aston-Reese?

My arm just went up. He's got an elite NHL-level finish, and his defense can't be as much of an issue as this team somehow mustering only 22 total shots, only 14 at five-on-five, and only three in the third period. Sliding Carter Rowney back in is the safe move, but he's not going to change that.

I'll repeat from above: Holtby's getting into a groove. That's got to change.

• Brassard to the fourth line, as was the case in this game for the first time since his arrival, is bound to cause a buzz. And it undoubtedly should. Acquiring him was a big deal -- no, it was the big deal, the one that cost Ian Cole, Ryan Reaves and all the remaining cap room that prevented anyone else from being added -- and that absolutely should be part of any evaluation well into the future.

But for now, it was the right move. And not just because Brassard hadn't done nearly enough to this point in the playoffs. Sullivan's priority had to be getting Kessel going, and the best candidate to help in this context -- striving for spread-out scoring -- was going to be Riley Sheahan, based on the chemistry they'd shown before the Brassard trade. And because neither Sheahan nor Kessel goes to the net much, Aston-Reese was the right choice to move with them.

The numbers affixed to the lines don't mean much in that scenario.

• Brassard still didn't produce a point, but he was far more engaged. I counted three physical skirmishes on the night, which is three more than he'd had the entire playoffs. Not suggesting everyone needs to do that, but the best version of Brassard -- in New York and Ottawa -- was way more annoying than this one.

• Don't waste an ounce of emotion clamoring for revenge. Jamie Oleksiak can take down anyone on the Washington roster, but he's alone. It's not going to happen.

Revenge is a dish best served with a handshake.

• This will get forgotten, but what Guentzel did to Dmitry Orlov should get him tried at The Hague:

That's how you really hurt the opponent. Bruises and even concussions can go away. That baby will be on viral loop for all of hockey eternity,

• There's no way T.J. Oshie isn't playing with a broken hand, judging by the way that clear struck him in the open palm in Game 2 and, more pertinent, by the way he could barely grip his stick in this one.

• Amazing scene before opening faceoff, as captured on my iPhone:

Amazingly, it would only get more amped.

Thursday still will blow it away. Nothing fires up a Pittsburgh crowd like being ticked off. This place, for the better part of Tuesday night, was as angry with Tom Wilson and the refs as I'd seen since the infamous Adam Graves festival of 1992. Graves had slashed Mario Lemieux's wrist in Game 2 at the Garden -- per instructions from Roger Neilson, as people of that era still claim -- and, due to a weird policy at the time, Graves was allowed to participate in Game 3 while awaiting an appeal of his suspension. The Rangers won that one at the Civic Arena, with Graves scoring, and the city was close to despondent over both.

Well, as longtime fans will recall, the Penguins took the next one on Ron Francis' deflection goal in overtime that brought what I'm still convinced is the loudest noise I've ever heard in our city for a hockey moment. Karma was oozing everywhere: Those evil Rangers blew a two-goal lead in part because of Francis' blast from center red through Mike Richter's pads, then had their captain, Mark Messier, stripped of the puck by Larry Murphy in the New York slot to set up Francis' hat trick.

The Penguins didn't lose another game in that playoff year, rifling off 11 in a row until raising the Cup in Chicago.

That, too, was a Game 4. Just saying.

MATT SUNDAY GALLERY