Some things are obvious, like the way Tristan Jarry's play for much of the first round in the Stanley Cup playoffs sabotaged any chance the Penguins had of advancing for the first time since 2018.
After all, when a goalie struggles, it generally doesn't matter what the 18 skaters in front of him do.
Others are tougher to figure out, such as why Sidney Crosby -- easily the Penguins' best faceoff man during 2020-21 -- suddenly had so much trouble on draws during the playoffs.
He handled 1,262 of them during the regular season, more than three times that of the nearest teammate (Teddy Blueger, 413), and controlled 53.6 percent.
During the playoffs, his success rate plunged to 42.2 percent, and he was particularly ineffective in the defensive zone, winning just 36.8 percent.
Crosby and team officials have insisted that he was not dealing with an injury, although video that showed his hand taped suggested otherwise, and Mike Sullivan floated the idea that perhaps his teammates didn't do as much to get control of "50-50" pucks as they had previously.
Perhaps, but it's hard to believe that Crosby's linemates, Bryan Rust and Jake Guentzel, suddenly decided to abandon the drive to compete that has fueled their careers.
Whatever the reason, though, the Penguins have to hope that the issue is resolved before next season.
Otherwise, they're going to have to find someone to take -- and win -- a lot of potentially game-changing faceoffs.
• It's been just two years since Columbus swept heavily favored Tampa Bay in the first round of the playoffs and, with the likes of Artemi Panarin, Pierre-Luc Dubois, Matt Duchene and Seth Jones on the roster, the Blue Jackets appeared to be a team on the rise. No. 1 goalie Sergei Bobrovsky wasn't in their long-term plans, but club officials hoped the others would be. Turns out, now that Jones has made it known that he won't re-sign in Columbus, none will be. The others moved on, and Jones likely will be once a suitable trade is worked out. Columbus, which went through a long building process to get to the point where it was on the cusp of a breakthrough, now faces the daunting challenge of doing it again. And the prospects of a full-blown rivalry between the Penguins and Blue Jackets, which is a geographic natural, likely will be delayed for a least a few more years.
• Gambling is the raison d'etre for many in and around Las Vegas -- and probably the main reason that the city's primary industry isn't exporting tumbleweeds -- but the one Golden Knights coach Peter DeBoer made before Game 1 of the second round is beyond perplexing. He concluded that Marc-Andre Fleury, who had played all seven games against Minnesota in the opening round, needed a rest, and gave Robin Lehner the start in the opener against Colorado. The payoff: A 7-1 loss. There's no reason to think Fleury would have won that game, considering how well the Avalanche played, but DeBoer not only sat a guy who thrives on a heavy workload but has risked disrupting the rhythm that allowed Fleury to put up a 1.71 goals-against average and .931 save percentage against the Wild. Next time DeBoer has a hunch like that, perhaps he and his wallet should just head for a roulette table.
• Former Penguins assistant Rick Tocchet -- you might recall that he played a bit in this town, too -- didn't have his contract renewed after four seasons as coach in Arizona, but he shouldn't be out of work for long. He's been prominently mentioned as a candidate to fill vacancies in Columbus, Seattle, Buffalo and with the New York Rangers. Both of Tocchet's head-coaching opportunities to date have been with teams that had dysfunctional ownerships -- he was in Tampa in 2008-09 and 2009-10, long before Jeffrey Vinik revived the franchise -- so it will be interesting to see what he can accomplish if he lands with one that has a clue, as well as money.
• The adage is that defense wins championships, and while playing well defensively doesn't guarantee a title, it's a pretty good way to at least give yourself a shot at one. The latest evidence of that comes from the North Division, where Winnipeg and Montreal, both of which emphasize team defense and have outstanding goaltenders, upset Edmonton and Toronto, which have considerably more offensive talent. Whichever team makes it through the Jets-Canadiens matchup figures to be a decided underdog in Round 3, but being able to keep games close means that almost any club will have at least a puncher's chance in a best-of-seven.
• Sullivan holds one of the most peculiar distinctions of any Penguins coach: He owns the franchise record for consecutive playoff series won (nine) as well as consecutive series lost (four). The latter streak of course, still is active.
• Remember Alex Galchenyuk? If not, it's understandable. After all, he had the impact of a chickadee feather on the franchise after being acquired from Arizona in the Phil Kessel trade in 2019, putting up five goals and 12 assists in 45 games before being pawned off on Minnesota in the Jason Zucker trade. After failed stints with the Wild and Ottawa (and a layover in Carolina), Galchenyuk was sent to Toronto, where he just might have found a home. He had four goals and eight assists in 26 regular-season games and, more important, got generally good reviews for his overall play. There's no reason to believe he'll be the player Montreal hoped it was getting when it picked him third overall at the 2012 draft at PPG Paints Arena, but Galchenyuk's impressive work ethic -- he spent a lot of time doing extra things after practices during his time with the Penguins -- might finally be paying off.
• Next time someone stresses the importance of earning home-ice advantage in the playoffs -- and you can assume it will happen no later than next spring -- remember that five of the eight first-round series this year were won by Nos. 3 and 4 seeds, teams that did not have home ice. That doesn't mean there's necessarily any advantage to starting a series on the road (or playing a Game 7 there), but does reinforce the idea that the value of home ice can be dramatically overstated -- and that if a team is going to succeed in the postseason, it must be able to win on the road.
• Boston's belief that Taylor Hall might be able to provide the Bruins with some badly needed secondary scoring has been rewarded. After scoring just twice in 37 games with Buffalo, he had eight goals in 16 games in the wake of Boston acquiring him at the trade deadline. He has three goals and an assist in seven playoff games, and if he can continue to produce at a goal-every-other-game pace, it should help to ease some of the pressure on the Bruins' go-to line of Patrice Bergeron between Brad Marchand and David Pastrnak and not allow the New York Islanders to focus all of their defensive attention on Bergeron's line throughout their second-round series.
• Fans of a certain vintage might recall the "Nine-Teen-Four-Tee" sing-song chant that was used to taunt the Rangers in a lot of arenas until the Rangers won a Cup in 1994, ending a 54-year drought. Lucky for Toronto that "Nine-teen-Six-Tee-Sev-En" doesn't roll off the tongue quite so easily.