1995 Pittsburgh Penguins - What happened?

[hacksaw7]

No Mario this season, but they end up acquiring Luc Robitaille in the offseason. Of course you can't fully expect him to make up for what Mario brings, but with Jagr taking that next step to dominance their offense is still a juggernaut. Projected over 84 games the Pens would've probably scored between 315 and 320 goals that year. Only Quebec scored more goals than they did. Francis, Stevens, Cullen, Mullen, McEachern, Larry Murphy...plus very talented youngsters like Naslund and Straka who were still finding their way in the NHL at the time. Vets like Ulf and Kjell Samuelsson on D. Later that season they'd bring in Norm MacIver and Troy Murray, two dependable players to bolster the roster (Murray's offense dried up but he was still a very good defensive forward)

They get off to an absolutely historic start during the 48 game lockout season. 12-0-1. They're scoring at an insane pace at this point, 4.7 goals a game which would be close to 400 over a full season.

The one tie in that stretch is to NJ, who dominated Pitt and would've blown them out out if not for Wregget...bit prophetic with how their season would end.

Wregget overall would have a great season

Then suddenly from Feb 24, 1995 until the end of the regular season they go a very ordinary 17-16-2. And not only that they're losing to bad teams and sometimes in embarrassing fashion. Tampa, the Islanders. The Panthers aren't bad but they shut them out. The Whalers annihilate them. They lose to the Habs several times.

This continues into the playoffs as Washington builds a 3-1 series lead before the usual happens. Though Pitt was very very lucky to even get past them. They sneak out a win vs NJ in game 1 on a rare Devils defensive breakdown and kind of a lucky goal (in a game where they didn't have much in terms of offense). So now when you have a super talented team that gets a few breaks and pulls their season out of the fire, it's time to seize the moment and make the best of your 2nd life. Curiously they are outplayed the rest of the way by NJ who really just looked like they wanted it more. Devils win 4 straight and take the series in 5

What went wrong with this team so suddenly, from 12-0-1 to a 22-23-2 stretch (counting playoffs) to finish their season. It seemed like this team could've and should've done way more, but it's like they got bored

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[Big Phil]

I think this is right around the time that the Pens' defense and goaltending was hurting them. They still had Larry Murphy this year, but after that, what have you got? An older Ulfie? He shouldn't be your best defenseman without Murphy. So the lack of depth on defense was showing. This is nothing new under the sun, win a couple of Cups in a row, even have a dominant third season after that and eventually you are going to pay for that success, especially when you have Mario injured the entire season. Another thing too, and it was a big one, Barrasso was hurt basically the whole year. That's not going to help. I was never a big Ken Wregget fan as a starter.

So you have a full season without Mario and Barrasso, a defense that is getting older and thinner, yeah, it isn't a shock that they bowed out 2nd round. Granted, they still had a pretty good year, and the forwards are still a formidable pack. Does anyone remember why Robitaille didn't stay after 1995?

 

[The Panther]

Well, you've got no Mario Lemieux and no Tom Barrasso, and with Eddie "let-the-players-do-what-they-want" Johnston behind the bench. Let's not forget that once Bowman departed, the Pens went from 3rd-best defensively to 19th overnight -- and then were the same in 1995.

I also think that weird, short 1995 season favored four-line, grinding teams more than star-powered, offensive clubs. There were a lot of games in a few days with no respite, and teams with balanced depth did better. I think that is why the Pens declined as the season went on.

No, I don't recall why Robitaille left either. He actually did pretty well there, though he faded a bit down the stretch in the regular season. He had 21 goals in the first 36 games, but then went goalless in 9 of the last 10 games. He did well in the first round against Washington, but then Jersey completely shut him down after the first game.

 

[Gurglesons]

Jagr wasn’t as good as his stats indicated.

Supporting cast kind of became trash after 93.

 

[CrosbyIsKing87]

Robitaille was traded after the season along with Samuelsson for Nedved and Zubov. A good trade for the Pens actually, although neither of those players stuck around long. That 1995 team had great top end offense and top pair defenseman but not enough depth and grit after that. They didn't get the dirty, timely goals that you need and the 4 through 6 Dmen couldn't stack up against the other teams in the division. Naslund never was able to get going in Pittsburgh that season or the next. It was said that he was a shy, reserved guy and was intimidated by the big personalities in the locker room (the Pens had lots of those). I seem to remember the goaltending being fine. Barrasso was hurt but that was when he started to become unreliable. Wregget was getting the job done. When they ran into New Jersey they just couldn't adjust to the Devils' tight checking style. That was really the beginning of the dead puck era and the trap. And also Brodeur was really good. The Pens missed Lemieux obviously but they were still able to score plenty of goals. It was the 2-1 and 1-0 defensive games they couldn't seem to win anymore. I remember Craig Patrick saying that he took the blame for not getting enough help at the trade deadline. Murray and Maciver were ok but they didn't really move the needle.

 

[vikash1987]

I always thought that the main reason they regressed after that 12-0-1 start was because the top line of Francis-Jagr-Robitaille started slumping. However, a big issue that emerged was apparently their struggles on the PK. Kjell Samuelsson and some other key defensive guys were out of the lineup for a stretch. Just a couple of examples: they gave up 4 PP goals (yikes!) against their arch rivals the Flyers on March 5, and 3 PP goals against the lowly Senators two weeks later

 

[Dessloch]

They ran into the best team in the league with the trap mode engaged = game over for any team in the league. And the Pens took 1 game, which the SC finalist Detroit could not even muster.

 

[popo]

It looks like Ulf Samuelsson was also missing in action from that series against New Jersey. On top of playing without Lemiuex or Barrasso that is a big loss. Pittsburgh had a weak defense relying on a lot of castoffs: Chris Joseph, Norm Maciver, Francois Leroux.
Penguins also just couldn't score against the combination of a Lemaire trap system, and Martin Brodeur's coming out party. Brodeur won the Calder the year before, but the dominant run to the Stanley Cup took his stock to elite status.