BUFFALO, N.Y. -- Rutger McGroarty played his first game in a Pittsburgh sweater on Friday for the first time since being acquired from the Jets last month ... and it's fair to say things went pretty well.
McGroarty, undoubtedly the Penguins' top prospect, made an impact in his side's 6-3 win over the Bruins to open the Prospects Challenge at the LECOM Harborcenter from the first faceoff, helping to win the opening draw by sweeping in and taking possession after his center, Vasily Ponomarev, tied up his counterpart. While there's certainly still room to grow, there's a lot to be pleased with about his debut, including a goal and an assist in the comeback victory.
McGroarty still was smiling well after the final buzzer, just happy to have played a close-to-real game for his new team.
"It was awesome," McGroarty said of the experience. "Obviously, the past couple weeks have been very hectic, so it was good to just go out there and do what I love, honestly. We all love the game so much, and throwing on the Penguins jersey, it's awesome. That was fun."
The Penguins trailed, 2-0, by the midway point of the first period, courtesy of one goal that just sneaked between the post and pad of Taylor Gauthier, and another that came toward the end of the Bruins' first power play. McGroarty helped get the Penguins on the board, firing a cross-ice pass to AHL-contracted forward Avery Hayes, who made easy work of the redirect in front:
Rutger McGroaty gets his first point as a penguin in the prospects tournament with a beautiful feed back door to Hayes. pic.twitter.com/PUoKY6NF2W
— ChelPenguins (@ChelPenguins) September 13, 2024
"It's actually a really sick tip, what he did," McGroarty said of the goal. "I mean, it looks easy. But it was kind of bobbling on him, and he deflected it and put it over the goalie's pad."
The Bruins quickly responded with a goal that undoubtedly would have been goaltender interference had this been a serious game with the opportunity for reviews. McGroarty then found himself at the center of a scrum down at the other end, a skirmish that ended in a Penguins power play ... along with a couple of the Bruins visibly agitated at McGroarty as he skated back to the bench unfazed. The Penguins capitalized on the ensuing power play, with another AHL-contracted forward, Gabe Klassen, cleaning up the rebound of a Vasily Ponomarev shot before the end of the first period.
Tristan Broz scored the go-ahead goal in the second with a bomb of a one-timer set up by defenseman Isaac Belliveau, and AHL-contracted forward Mathieu De St. Phalle extended the lead not long after.
McGroarty got in on the scoring himself late in the second period, when Hayes drove to the net with the puck and setup McGroarty to bury a loose puck:
Rutger McGroaty scores his first goal for the Penguins in the prospects tournament.
— ChelPenguins (@ChelPenguins) September 13, 2024
Another great shift from the McGroaty-Ponomarev-Hayes line.
1 goal, 2 points, through 2 periods for Rutger. 5-3 penguins. pic.twitter.com/jbzEFo2ITS
"I tracked back, and then Ponomarev made a good play at the blue line," McGroarty recalled of the whole play. "Then we kind of just hemmed them in, created good O-zone time. Then I got the puck in high ice. I made a bad mistake this shift before, so I decided just to put it deep. Then (Hayes) got it and took it to the net. I kind of just had an open net, to be honest."
Broz capped off the comeback in the third period with his second goal of the night, a one-timer off the rush from Ville Koivunen. McGroarty nearly made it a 7-3 game in the final minutes, ringing a shot off the post on the power play.
Overall, McGroarty saw his debut as something to build on.
"It was good," he said. "There were ups and downs, for sure. I mean, it is the first game, but I feel like I definitely have more. There was some good as well, but I could definitely get a lot better."
There's a lot been made about McGroarty's skating being a weakness. A lot of the analysis from pundits -- coincidentally out of Canada, coincidentally after he got traded out of a Canadian market -- would make one believe the guy needs one of those learn-to-skate walkers out there. Could he be faster, particularly when it comes to his acceleration to start? Sure. Were there a couple times when he was a step or two behind the play and needed time to catch up? Sure. But the knocks on his skating are pretty exaggerated, especially for a guy who is incredibly young and just turned 20 years old in March.
I asked Kirk MacDonald -- Wilkes-Barre/Scranton's new coach, who is coaching the Penguins' prospects in this tournament -- what he thought of McGroarty's skating in particular. He helped put things in perspective.
"His skating is fine," MacDonald said. "I think one thing about this event, the prospects and these young guys, they all need work, right? That's not a negative, that's part of the development process. That's what we're here for, to help them get better. Could his skating improve? Yeah, but so could everybody's, or they wouldn't be here. We're here to work with them and help them all get better."
But overall, MacDonald was pleased with what he saw from McGroarty, including how his line with Ponomarev and Hayes worked together.
"It's always tough coming in being a new guy, one practice and then throwing everybody into a game," MacDonald said. "But I thought their line did a great job. Everybody made a lot of plays. He has a great release in tight, he had some great looks on the power playing that bumper spot. So a great first game and lots to work on."
It's a quick turnaround from this tournament to the NHL training camp -- the Penguins have two more games Saturday and Monday, and then on-ice sessions for camp begin Wednesday. It'd be nice for McGroarty to have a good showing in this tournament against his peers but, if he's going to earn an NHL roster spot, that'll be done in training camp and the preseason. He's hoping this tournament sets him up to do that.
"You can't replicate a game in the summer," he said. "So I feel like this is actually huge for us going into training camp, getting our legs under us, getting our cardio back, and just feeling comfortable with the puck as well. I feel like puck management's the biggest thing. I feel like at the NHL level, you have to be able to manage the puck and put it in the right places. Also, just learning the systems as well. I feel like that's big for us. Obviously, it's new systems, a new team. So I feel like that will definitely give us a head start. It's nice."
McGroarty projects as a top-six winger in the NHL, though his physicality and two-way game might not make him look out of place if he ends up in the bottom-six to start. A lot remains up in the air as far as the Penguins' line combinations go, and it's definitely not out of the question that McGroarty could end up in the Penguins' top-six over the next few weeks.
McGroarty said that he's "definitely" thought of the possibility of playing alongside the likes of Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin, and that the idea is "super cool." But he's not getting too far ahead of himself just yet.
"Right now, I mean, I've gotta get there," he said. "I feel like today was a good first step. Just keep building on it, keep getting better and better, and then hopefully leave a good impression at training camp."
MICHELLE CRECHIOLO / PENGUINS
Tristan Broz in his Penguins debut in the Prospects Challenge on Friday in Buffalo, N.Y.
MORE FROM THE PROSPECTS CHALLENGE
• The reigning ECHL Goaltender of the Year, Gauthier, played the first half of the game and stopped seven of 10 shots ... with the aforementioned third goal being one that shouldn't have counted. One of the Bruins plowed clean into the net and him just before the goal was scored, and Gauthier got knocked down. The referee said that his ability to play the puck wasn't impacted, despite him being on his back. But it's an exhibition tournament in September, so everyone moved on.
• Sergei Murashov came in midway through the second period -- a planned switch as they typically do in these tournaments -- and he stopped all seven shots faced. The Penguins only allowed eight shots total over the last two periods, so Murashov didn't have much of a workload with the team in front of him tightening things up. My educated guess would be Murashov starts the full game Monday.
• The Penguins used these lines and pairings:
Rutger McGroarty - Vasily Ponomarev - Avery Hayes
Beau Jelsma - Tristan Broz - Ville Koivunen
Cooper Foster - Gabe Klassen - Mathieu De St. Phalle
Atley Calvert - Logan Pietila - Jack Beck
Owen Pickering - Scooter Brickey
Isaac Belliveau - Finn Harding
Caeden Carlisle - Harrison Brunicke
• First power-play unit: Owen Pickering, McGroarty, Koivunen, Broz, Hayes
• Second power-play unit: Harrison Brunicke, Jack Beck, Atley Calvert, Gabe Klassen, Ponomarev
• Worth noting that this was Pickering's Prospects Challenge debut -- he was injured in each of the last two years they went. He had an OK debut, and a couple of turnovers. On Pickering, MacDonald said, "I thought he did a really good job with some of his reads. I think he does a good job, especially down low, using his reach. He did a good job up top on the power play distributing, kind of making good reads on when to pound the puck or when to distribute."
• Isaac Belliveau took two penalties (the second of which was questionable) but I thought he otherwise stood out for good reasons. He's physical, is skilled at using his 6-foot-2, 188-pound frame to clear the crease, and has a bit of a mean streak to his game. The primary assist on the tying goal was a nice bonus, too.
• Broz was still hurting after the game as a result of biting his tongue on his very first shift.
• Broz on his first goal, the one-timer from Belliveau: "Really, just a great play by Belly. I kind of just popped out to the side and he made a nice cross-seam pass to me."
• Just before Broz's second goal, his stick broke and he made a beeline to the bench for a replacement before scoring: "I thought it was a slash," he said. "I think usually you're pretty helpless out there without a stick, and it's still kind of 50-50, so I thought I'd get it quick. And fortunately, they didn't call it a slash, because we've got a three-on-one right after that. And yeah, credit to the equipment guy for getting my stick really quick." That would be Matt Mitchell, Wilkes-Barre's head equipment manager.
• Between development camp and now this tournament, I asked Broz what his impressions have been of Wilkes-Barre head coach MacDonald: "You can tell he's a really good coach. And obviously there's kind of a weird tournament where we only had one practice together. But I like his demeanor, I can tell he's a really good coach."
• Along with MacDonald, Wilkes-Barre's assistant coaches Sheldon Brookbank and Nick Luukko and Nailers head coach Derek Army were behind the bench. The Penguins brought a ton of management and other staff -- including Kyle Dubas, Jason Spezza, Vukie Mpofu, Amanda Kessel, Tom Kostopoulos, Andy Saucier, Mike Sullivan, Mike Vellucci and David Quinn to observe.
• Back at it Saturday for another early one, noon against the Senators. The Penguins are scheduled to skate on Sunday before wrapping this all up with a 5 p.m. game against the Sabres on Monday. They're the defending champs of this tournament, so they've got a title to defend.
