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BOSTON -- Lars Eller wasn't signed this past summer to be the Penguins' leader. Nor was he signed to be their peak performer over any sustained stretch.
He's been both of late. Think about that.
Want to know how an invested veteran should look after his team's lost four of its past five games, after his team's been outscored, 23-7, over its past 13 periods, after his team's put forth back-to-back beyond-embarrassing efforts back home, and then now after being blown off the TD Garden scoreboard by the Bruins, 5-1, on this Saturday evening?
Here's how it should look:
I asked Eller if this effort -- in the truest sense of that term -- was better than the previous two. After which the man would run his fingers through that conspicuously soaked blond mane as if he'd rather rip it out, then replied, "Yeah, but it could only get better from the last game. I feel like we have another level that we need to get to."
Exactly. This wasn’t enough.
I swear, he might be among the few athletes I'll waste anyone's time interviewing for the rest of this NHL schedule. If only because he appears to be among the precious few prepared to salvage something, anything from it.
Look, I get it. I hate the Jake Guentzel trade, too. Can't make it clearer than I've already done. I hate losing the player. I hate losing the person. I hate what it means for -- and to -- Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and Kris Letang. Above all, I really, really hate Kyle Dubas’ return coupled with his curious, confessed choice to not engage Jake’s agent in extension talks after the season began.
But Jake's gone. He’s in Raleigh.
And memo to all who've been left in his wake: No amount of pouting or counter-productivity's about to bring him back.
This effort against Boston, as Eller acknowledged, was for-real better than the weeklong glide-and-giveaway demonstrations that preceded it. The Penguins for-real outshot a Stanley Cup contender, 40-22, they for-real outplayed the Bruins through 40 minutes and ..: it all for-real fell apart by following the all-too-familiar script of bad finishing, bad breakdowns and bad everything in any third period.
Plus, as a recently added bonus, bad body language.
Don't take my word for it. Focus on what led to the opponents' five goals and, within those, the body language of the visitors:
See?
Now watch the body language when Letang scored the lone goal off Sid's faceoff win:
— DK Pittsburgh Sports (@DKPSmedia) March 9, 2024
I mean, yikes. That cut the deficit to two with 17:09 remaining in regulation, and that group shrug was the reaction. As if it were preseason.
All three of the Core have my immeasurable respect. I can’t conceive of that ever changing. And to single out Sid, he’s earned every mulligan in hockey and in life. That’s why I've empathized with him losing his linemate, losing his friend, maybe losing some hope for what can be achieved with the rest of his career. That’s why I scarcely mentioned any of this after Columbus or Washington.
But ... how much more of this should be expected? Or accepted?
Sid’s assist on Letang’s goal up there was his first point in four games. He registered zero of the Penguins' 40 shots peppered onto Linus Ullmark. He registered one of the Penguins' 71 attempted shots, and that was a harmless flick in the final ticks of the first period.
Afterward, he spoke of the standard stuff when asked about the latest run in the series binge: "I don't think we got enough traffic. We had some shots, but we didn't do a good enough job getting those second opportunities. Lars hit the crossbar on a great chance. That would've changed momentum a little bit. Yeah, I think we've just to get a little more traffic and either get to those rebounds or draw penalties."
No surprise. Sid’s seldom been one to stir it up in front of cameras and microphones, and he’s not about to start now. When asked about the Jake trade back home on the night it'd become known, he offered praise for Jake through a pained expression, followed by, “It’s all I can say.”
Right. All he can say.
Listen, there can't be a more excruciating exercise in sports columnizing than to criticize Sid. But at this pivotal fork for this franchise, everyone and everything that's part of the process would be far better served by this roster putting its best figurative skate forward. Which, in turn, would begin with the best player going first.
Same with Geno, who also had no shots, marking the first time both Sid and Geno were shot-less in a shared game in almost three years.
Same with Letang.
If all three genuinely plan to endure whatever rebuild/reload Dubas might have in mind -- and all comments to date strongly support that they will -- then they've got to lead. Not Eller. Not Marcus Pettersson. Not anyone else. The Core three have got to restore pride and confidence as soon as plausible. They’ve got to set the stage for whatever form the next wave might take. And my goodness, they sure can't serve in the reverse as anyone’s license — or worse, a signal — to sink in some similar way.
I don’t care what the standings show. That can’t happen anymore.
Mike Sullivan’s got his share of culpability, too. He can’t allow this any longer, and he shouldn’t have allowed it to carry into the weekend. He needed to be loud. He needed to be in people’s faces, including those of the most prized people. And most important, he needed to have those words heeded.
I asked Sullivan how this effort stacked up to its predecessors.
“I thought we competed hard,” he’d reply. “I thought we had better energy. I thought we had more compete in our game. I thought we had a great start. Our first seven or eight minutes were really strong, and we had a couple of good looks."
Of newcomer Michael Bunting, he'd add, "Bunts gets a breakaway early and, if we score there, it probably gives us some juice. They get a good save. That's hockey. There were parts of the game that we really liked, but there were other instances where I think we'd just shoot ourselves in the foot a little bit, which is a lack of awareness or diligence or whatever."
He's never criticized the Core to the media, which I've long lauded, and he's not about to start now. But that doesn't mean it can't/shouldn't occur out of public view.
I asked Ryan Graves about effort, too. He struggled again here, but he tells it like it is.
“It’s just, I think, a lack of discipline," he'd begin. "A couple of the goals, we’ve got odd-mans against, things like that where it doesn’t take much for guys to get some room and to make you pay. And then, once you get down, you start forcing it, stuff like that. It’s definitely not the goalie. It’s nothing like that."
Nope. Alex Nedeljkovic's save percentage took a hit with five goals on 22 shots, and there was one I wasn't wild about, but he wasn't a factor.
"It’s just attention to detail and a compete level," Graves continued, "that needs to be a bit better.”
I then asked about any lingering Jake effect.
"Yeah, I mean, you have to be able to compete. You have to be able to bring your best game every night. It doesn’t matter what the situation is, trade deadline or not, you need to be able to block out the noise. Whatever’s happened in these last couple games just isn't acceptable.”
Right. Whatever's happened.
So much has gone so wrong for these Penguins, most of it within the past month. A hard bottom’s needed. A rebound’s needed before any recovery. Maybe that rebound can be backhanded where it belongs.
GETTY
Jesse Puljujarvi shoots in front of the Bruins' Brandon Carlo in the first period Saturday in Boston.
• A lousy line change contributed to Boston's third goal: Jesse Puljujarvi and Emil Bemstrom were slow to the bench despite having been static at center ice for several seconds. Eller, their center, was out there, too, but he'd just gone full throttle on a backcheck and was behind the wingers on the way off.
Regardless, I don't care much. I see symptoms, I see causes and, within that, I see distraction issues. Low-hanging fruit.
• I'd say the same for Pettersson. Rough game. His second all season, by my count.
• Bunting skated alongside Sid at five-on-five and logged 19:36 of ice, three shots, five attempted shots, three hits, a game-high three takeaways and, less tangibly, an encouraging spring to his step, especially early.
That won applause from Sid and Sullivan, and a slight smile from Bunting when I brought it up:
"I just wanted to come in and play with confidence and play my game," he'd say. "I didn't want to be too nervous because then I knew my game wouldn't go well. I took as it as any other game and felt confident and tried to roll with it."
Good for him.
• Erik Karlsson's night saw a minus-2 rating ... even though he was on the rink at five-on-five for 18 Pittsburgh shots and four Boston shots. That's nuts. So half of those Boston shots were goals.
• Even nuttier stat I'm too tired to research myself would be the total of opposing goaltenders who've been named No. 1 star against them, while also having made 35-plus saves. Linus Ullmark made 39 saves here, two nights after the Capitals' Charlie Lindgren stopped all 39 shots he faced at PPG Paints Arena to earn that No. 1 star.
• Here come Connor McDavid, Leon Draisaitl and company Sunday, 1:12 p.m., at PPG Paints Arena. I'll fly back in time to cover that, as well.
• Bill Virdon days till Miami.
• Thanks for reading!
