Penguins hope to make a case for the defense taken at PPG Paints Arena (Penguins)

PENGUINS

Mike Matheson.

The Penguins realize they aren't going to score three goals in 61 seconds, the way they did in the first period Sunday, very often.

But they do contend that they are capable of consistently replicating the effort that allowed them to stifle the New York Rangers' offense after turning a 1-0 deficit into a 3-1 lead in that game.

The Penguins limited the Rangers to 14 shots on goalie Casey DeSmith during the final 42-plus minutes of regulation following the burst of goals by John Marino, Kasperi Kapanen and Sidney Crosby, and yielded very few serious scoring chances.

"That's our baseline," defenseman Mike Matheson said after the Penguins' game-day skate Tuesday. "I really don't think we gave them very much off the rush. They're a team that preys on that -- they've got a lot of speed -- and I think we did a good job with our gaps and not allowing them to get clean (zone) entries.

"And then, in our (defensive) zone, we were pretty solid, really. We didn't give up too much. Everything was to the outside. That's what we want to be able to play like, and that's what we hold ourselves accountable to."

The next test of the Penguins' ability to defend so well will come when they face the Rangers today at 6:08 p.m. at PPG Paints Arena, New York's final regular-season appearance of 2020-21 there.

While the Penguins' offensive abilities are obvious, how they perform defensively will have a profound impact on how much success they have this season.

"That's an essential part of winning consistently in this league, your ability to keep the puck out of your net and be hard to play against," Mike Sullivan said. "We've got to make sure we have collective effort and we execute on the defensive side of the puck. When we go that, we're hard to play against. A lot of it just boils down to attention to detail and commitment."

MORE FROM THE SKATE:

Jared McCann, who had been filling in for Jason Zucker at left wing on the second line, will not play tonight after being injured Sunday and is "day-to-day," Sullivan said. McCann's spot presumably again will be filled by Evan Rodrigues, who handled that duty capably Sunday, and said his job description does not change when he moved up from a bottom-six role. "You play the game the same way, no matter who you're playing with," he said. "You try to make the right plays. Get pucks in, get pucks out. Do all the right things. And when you get your chances offensively, you try to bury them."

• Although Matheson's offensive game is his forte, he said he is getting increasingly acclimated to how the Penguins play defense."The more games I've been getting into, the more comfortable I've been with the system and the way they like to play," he said. "Obviously, the best way to play is when you're playing off your instincts, and the best way to do that is to get more experience within that type of play."

Tristan Jarry is scheduled be in goal for the Penguins, making his 11th start in the past 13 games.

• Matheson, who was playing for Florida when the NHL suspended play last March 12, said the Panthers were preparing for a game in Dallas when they got work that the league was shutting down, at least temporarily. "I was sitting in my hotel room the night before our scheduled game, and the Dallas Mavericks were playing in Dallas, so I was watching that on TV," he said. "That's when they got the phone call that their game was being shut down. It's weird. We were still expecting to play our game, somehow. I don't now why that made any sense at the time."

Loading...
Loading...