Kovacevic: (Only) Jarry rises up amid consecutive losses to contenders

There's scant satisfaction to be culled from consecutive clunkers against Stanley Cup contenders.

Really, in both these losses, 4-3 to the Hurricanes on this Sunday at PPG Paints Arena and 4-1 three days earlier in Toronto, the Penguins conceded all kinds of Class A chances, got toasted in transition time and again, carelessly coughed up possessions and, in general, put up far too little resistance. And I'm being kind in limiting any such list.

But also, there's this:

My goodness, Tristan Jarry just won't stop.

Not going to lie: I left this rink on this day with the same predominant thought that I had north of the border the other night. And that's this goaltender, who's becoming entrenched among the NHL's elite with every additional gem, will be more than ready come Game 1. Wherever. Against whoever.

"You can't say enough good things about him this year," Evan Rodrigues would say of Jarry after this one. "He's just been incredible for us. They have, I don't know, two, three breakaways in the first, a couple more in the second ... but he's just been standing on his head for us. And you know, we didn't get a comeback for him today, but he's been keeping us in games all year long. And I think, as a whole team, we're extremely happy for him."

Happy for him and, no doubt, happy to have him.

In Toronto, by my count, Jarry shut down two clean breakaways and three partial breaks. Here, that count was three clean breakaways and four partial breaks. And considering the array of shooters on these two opponents -- Auston Matthews (34 goals), Sebastian Aho (22) and Andrei Svechnikov (22) rank among the NHL's top 25 in finishing -- that's exemplary unto itself.

This is to say nothing of Jarry's overall work, particularly in tight, where the Maple Leafs besieged him and, by rights, should've pumped home the same six or seven the Hurricanes should've. Carolina's total of 30 shots would feel low for anyone who witnessed this, but that's because 12 of those were via high-danger chances, including all those breaks. 

When the Hurricanes were up, 2-0, it could've been 4-0 or 5-0. And when the Penguins scored twice in a 3:16 span of the second to tie, it could've already been a long-lost cause. One player -- and one alone -- ensured it wasn't.

Quibble away, free of context, about giving up any goals at all. Some ignoramus always does:

But the cold fact is that this is precisely the caliber of goaltending the Penguins will need in a competitive East and, within that, nothing could've mattered more from these two outcomes than Jarry outperforming everyone else.

• Anyone doubting my assessing Jarry as elite, try these on for size, even after two losses and eight goals allowed:

Wins: 25, tied for fourth in NHL
Starts: 39, third
Save percentage: .922, fifth
Goals-against average: 2.27, fifth
Average goal distance: 19.84 feet, eighth

I love that last one, as it underscores how hard he's become to beat from longer range. It takes screens, tips or other routes inside the box the Penguins usually are sound at defending.

• All that said, it wouldn't kill the group to get back to being sound at any type of defending.

I asked Mike Sullivan if these past two losses might offer teaching/learning opportunities that lesser opponents couldn't offer:

"For sure," he'd reply. "We just played two good teams, I thought the games were very different in how they were played. I loved our fight in this game today. I thought we battled hard. The second half of this game, I felt like we were the better team. And I thought, the first half of the game, they were."

It's then that he brought up the Penguins giving up goals at the exact nine-second mark of the second and third periods.

"I just think there were certain instances -- I always define those as critical moments -- where you've got to make sure you control them in order to give yourself the best chance to win."

Taylor Haase has more on this.

• Sullivan went on to elaborate on the remark about this game being different than the one in Toronto.

"I thought we competed hard. I thought there were a lot of good things to take from this game. The fight down the stretch was impressive. From our standpoint, this team's never out of it. We were down a couple of goals, and we were never out of it. ... But, like I said, I just thought we self-inflicted a little bit."

Eh ... I've seen them compete a lot harder than they did at any point here.

• How rare were the rapid-fire goals out of an intermission?

Try unprecedented:

• Brian Dumoulin was most culpable, by a mile, on Carolina's third goal that gave away the lead for good. And he acknowledged as much, saying, "Obviously, that's one you'd like to have back."

What a strange season he's had. Might've been the best overall player on the rink a few days ago in Boston. But he's also been prone to lapses that've never been his norm.

• The most marked change between the mythical first and second halves of this game was that the Penguins:

1. Cut out a lot of the lateral stuff
2. Put pucks/bodies at Antti Raanta

Like this by Bryan Rust ...

... and this completely off-the-script, grip-it-and-rip-it effort by Sidney Crosby:

Seriously, try to recall more than a handful of goals like that out of his 501. I can't.

I asked Rust if this might be part of what'd gone missing these past two games.

"Possibly," he'd reply. "I hadn't really thought about it like that, but I think when things aren't going well, that's definitely a way to turn it around, to simplify, get a little hungrier around the net. Yeah, I think that's definitely where we can score some goals."

• Rust's goal and assist gave him 30 points in 19 games since the calendar flipped to 2022. In that time, no one in the NHL has more points.

Cha-ching!

• This lineup's missing Teddy Blueger way more than anyone should be comfortable conceding. He makes a lot of things add up ... that don't currently add up.

• I'll renew my call from Toronto to insert new, fresh faces into this lineup. Not for the now, but for the short-term future. The more the Penguins learn about Radim Zohorna, Drew O'Connor, maybe even Alex Nylander -- who's lighting it up in Wilkes-Barre -- the stronger their entire depth chart will be come playoffs. And it's not as if the bottom-six is overloaded with productivity at the moment.

• On that note ...

... hey, Evan Rodrigues scored! 

Snapped an 18-game drought with that.

"You try not to think about it when the puck's not going in for you," he'd say. "You just try to almost shoot your way through it. You try to stay confident and positive throughout it. But it was obviously nice to see that one go in today and, hopefully, I can build from there."

That'd help. What a difference he'd made through Christmas.

• When debating the top lines in hockey, those in Boston and Denver invariably wind up 1-2 in one order or the other. And I wouldn't dispute either.

But I've got to say, too, that the Hurricanes' headliners -- Svechnikov, Aho and Teuvo Teravainen -- impressed me as much as any all winter. They create something from nothing as quickly as any line in the league, and their chemistry can be breathtaking.

Watch Teravainen's eyes before he feeds Aho for the fourth Carolina goal, this on a power play at 14:18 of the third:

That's an NBA-style lookoff that fooled every black sweater on the ice. All Aho had to do was drift back, release and raise his arms. None of which was an accident.

• The Hurricanes are legit. I've argued in recent years that all they were missing was goaltending, but they've got that now with Fredrik Andersen and Raanta, plus speed, skill and depth up front, plus as mobile and dynamic a defense corps as any.

On this day, the latter was tasked with playing a man down after Brendan Smith was struck on the helmet by a Danton Heinen shot in the first.

“Our D played phenomenal, logging all those minutes,” Rod Brind’Amour would say. “I give them a lot of credit.”

There was an encouraging update on Smith, who'd been taken up the Bluff to UPMC-Mercy after being struck, from the Hurricanes afterward:

• Thanks for reading, as always.

THE ESSENTIALS

• Boxscore
• Live file
• Scoreboard
• Standings
• Statistics

THE THREE STARS

As selected at PPG Paints Arena:

1. Sebastian Aho, Hurricanes C
2. Jordan Staal, Hurricanes C
3. Bryan Rust, Penguins RW

THE HIGHLIGHTS

THE INJURIES

• Drew O'Connor, left winger, has been on LTIR since Jan. 15 with an upper-body injury. He's practicing.

• Teddy Blueger, center, has been on IR since undergoing surgery to repair a fractured jaw Jan. 24. He's expected to miss 6-8 weeks. He's skating.

• Jason Zucker, left winger, has been on IR since undergoing core muscle surgery Jan. 25. He's week-to-week.

• Louis Domingue, goaltender, has been on IR since he was struck by a puck in the right foot at a morning skate Jan. 20. He's week-to-week.

THE LINEUPS

Sullivan’s lines and pairings:

Guentzel-Crosby-Rust
Heinen-Malkin-Carter
McGinn-Rodrigues-Kapanen
Aston-Reese-Boyle-Simon

Dumoulin-Letang
Pettersson-Marino
Matheson-Ruhwedel

And for Brind'Amour's Hurricanes:

Svechnikov-Aho-Teravainen
Lorentz-Trocheck-Necas
Niederreiter-Staal-Fast
Martinook-Kotkaniemi-Jarvis

Slavin-DeAngelo
Skjei-Pesce
Bear-Smith

THE SCHEDULE

Monday's a scheduled day off. Tuesday and Wednesday are practice days, followed by a Thursday home game against the Devils. Faceoff for that's 7:08 p.m.

THE CONTENT

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