Sullivan unveils all-new power plays

PHILADELPHIA -- A day after giving up four special-teams goals in a lopsided loss to the Sharks, the Penguins worked on their power-play and penalty-kill units.

And then they worked on their power-play and penalty-kill units again.

It was nothing but that late Friday afternoon at Lincoln Financial Field, where the Stadium Series game Saturday night with the Flyers is still scheduled to take place. Sure, all concerned seemed to soak in the atmosphere of the Eagles' home field and enjoy the traditional family skate afterward. But this is unmistakably a business trip for the Penguins, and business, for the moment, is about special teams.

"I think our players are well aware of where we sit in the standings and the opportunity that's ahead of us and the challenge that's ahead of us," Mike Sullivan said after the 45-minute practice. "We don't have any sort of false notion that we are in a playoff spot."

Indeed, the Penguins are in a precarious spot. They are third in the Metropolitan Division but just a point ahead of the Hurricanes, who hold the East's final wild card spot. They are just two points ahead of the Blue Jackets, who are currently out of the playoff field but greatly improved their chances Friday with the acquisition of Matt Duchene from Ottawa. The Penguins will face them in Columbus on Tuesday.

But first things first. Since the start of the month, the power play is 6 for 23. Most troubling, it surrendered yet another short-handed goal — Evander Kane’s goal Thursday was the NHL-worst 13th on the season.

Accordingly, Sullivan again employed two defensemen on the points in practice Friday, pairing Kris Letang and Brian Dumoulin behind Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and Patric Hornqvist, then Marcus Pettersson and Justin Schultz behind Phil Kessel, Jake Guentzel and Nick Bjugstad.

"We've gone a long time with the units that we have," the coach said when I asked about the change. "We haven't seen the necessary momentum that we think (we need) to continue. Having said that, we know we have a group of five that are dynamic when they're on top of their game. We'll make those decisions on a game-by-game basis. Today we practiced on some different options. Whether we choose to go with those, that's going to be a discussion that the coaching staff is going to have."

Though the Penguins didn't show any line combinations Friday, judging by the color of his practice jersey, it appears that Hornqvist could be reunited on the top line with Crosby. Hornqvist, who scored 29 goals last season, has now gone 15 games without a goal. Obviously, the Penguins are desperate to get him going offensively.

Hornqvist declined to confirm his line placement, but he said that he and his teammates just have to keep things simple.

"It's the same things with the power play, we have to move the puck and do the small things right," Hornqvist said. "Things are going to come to us.  Take the shots when they're there. Just go back and play simple and hard for each other."

Likewise, the Penguins' penalty-kill has fared little better and is now ranked 13th at 80.7 percent after giving up three goals Thursday. Since Feb. 1, they've allowed nine goals on 31 chances.

"We've got to keep it out of our net, I'm probably stating the obvious," Sullivan said. "For me, it boils down to the details, getting 200-foot clears, getting shot blocks, taking care of the net front. We've given up some rebounds of late where we've got to do a better job of controlling the sticks and bodies in front. It really boils down to the details. When we're locked into the details, we're as stingy a penalty kill as there is."

• Sullivan did not name his starting goalie but it's a fairly safe assumption that it will be Matt Murray. The tell-tale sign was the GoPro anchored to the top of his facemask. This will be Murray's second outdoor game start, having earned the win in the 2017 Stadium Series game against the Flyers.

Playing in an outdoor game presents a different challenge for most goalies: Depth perception. It can't be easy to pick up a puck in such a large venue, right?

Murray said it's not that bad:

• To the surprise of most in these parts, the Flyers will start Brian Elliott in goal over Carter Hart. The rookie phenom has been pulled from his past two starts, giving up three goals on nine shots in each, including Thursday night's loss to Montreal. But, as coach Scott Gordon explained after the home team's later practice, "It really bothered me to make the final decision to not play him. Two weeks ago that was looking like it was going to be the decision. I said to Carter, 'This is gonna hurt,' but the biggest thing is this is our biggest game of the year, but as far as a lineup decision, it's what's best for the team."

• The Flyers made one other change at practice, moving Claude Giroux back to left wing on the top line, centered by Nolan Patrick. Their full combinations in the session:

Giroux-Patrick-Konecny

Lindblom-Couturier-Voracek

Raffl-Laughton-Simmonds

van Riemsdyk-Varone-Bailey

Provorov-Sanheim

Hägg-MacDonald

Gostisbehere-Myers

• For once, just maybe, Crosby won't be the most reviled Penguins player in Philadelphia. That distinction may go to Malkin. This will be the first time the Penguins have faced the Flyers since an ugly stick swinging incident involving Malkin and the Flyers' Michael Raffl. Malkin has since served his one-game NHL suspension but he can expect to hear it from the Philly faithful. "It's not going to be warm, I can tell you that," Malkin linemate Zach Aston-Reese was telling me.

• Crosby's used to getting booed by 18,000 across the parking lot at Wells Fargo Center. This will be that, times three.  "It's a challenging road game, especially with the amount of people you can pack in this place," Crosby said. "I would expect a challenging game and much different than the one we had in Pittsburgh a couple years ago."

• Tanner Pearson looked no worse for wear after his fight with Kane on Thursday. "I've done it before," he said. "If it happens, it happens. Obviously, I'm not going to go looking for it but I'm not going to get pushed around either."

• The helmets that each team will wear are, well, a little different than usual. Each features one large team logo on one side and the player's number on the other. "I think they're unbelievable," Dominik Simon said.

• For the record, everyone said the ice was good at ‘The Linc.’ We'll see if that's the case after some rain on Saturday. That said, almost every outdoor game is usually not very good hockey. Letang, who will be in his fourth, said: "If it's ugly out there, you want to simplify things."

MATT SUNDAY GALLERY