Post-Game Talk: Pens/Isles Game 1: Home Ice + Good Matchup all for nothing

[Big Friggin Dummy]

Geno's entire job if/when he comes back this playoff is get Kap the puck and be an asset on the PP. Asking anything more of the guy with his knee in shambles is setting him up for abject failure, and another season of Mark Madden screeching between fistfuls of greasy fried chicken like some kinda Invader Zim character.

 

[FunkySeeFunkyDo]

Holy overreaction...lol

Crosby’s time in Pittsburgh has been epic. Now please make it stop

I kinda wished I didn’t have the article a click.

 

[Ugene Magic]

You expected McCann and Kapanen to be 60+ pt forwards?

I take into account a shorten season, playing up with injuries magnified things. This is just one of those seasons you don't take for face value.

 

[AuroraBorealis]

I take into account a shorten season, playing up with injuries magnified things. This is just one of those seasons you don't take for face value.

Can only speak for myself, but I didn't expect Kapanen to be our most productive 5v5 player by a large margin.

NHL Stats

 

[Gurglesons]

I take into account a shorten season, playing up with injuries magnified things. This is just one of those seasons you don't take for face value.

I’m not sure what you are saying.

My point is our season was largely won on the back of the guy Sullivan is quick to remove from our top six and the guy who says he is a center and Sully plays at wing.

 

[LOGiK]

I’m not sure what you are saying.

My point is our season was largely won on the back of the guy Sullivan is quick to remove from our top six and the guy who says he is a center and Sully plays at wing.

And the game geno returned the lines were juggled big time and it produced the same effect today.

In part I kinda blame the line juggle and in part I blame the Isles... or credit the isles... however you want to look at it

I expect a bounce back game 2. If not, well, thats that.

 

[Jacob]

I think it stinks Jarry had to have a stinker in game 1. If it was like 2 or 5 we’d probably feel a lot better about it. Seems ominous due to past goalies.

 

[Andy99]

man, it stinks to be a Pittsburgh sports fan rn...

 

[cygnus47]

This loss came down to Jarry sucking and Sully failing to get the guys ready for the 3rd period. The 1st and 2nd periods were great, the 3rd period we came out looking to defend instead of trying to keep the pressure up. It looked like we swapped jerseys after the 2nd.

I'm trying very hard to not be pessimistic, but this is what I feared would happen. We shouldn't NEED the bounces, we shouldn't have let them stay in the game. We should have come out HARDER in the 3rd, not backed off. Especially with how Jarry was playing. Where's the identity? Where's the support for your nervous goalie? This mental fragility is why we have average underlying numbers. We got the bounces we needed a lot in the regular season, hopefully we didn't use up all our puck luck.

We'll see if Sully can get them to put this one behind them. I hope he's been told his job is on the line, because it should be.

 

[Pens x]

Sully isn’t sleepy’s guy. Losing in the first round would be such an easy way for the new management to dump Sully.

 

[lastcupever75]

as bad as jarry was, we're lucky we didn't lose by 2-3 goals with the isles having great chances with half the net empty but couldn't finish

 

[Pens x]

We will see. It has been insinuated that one reason Philly fired Hexy was his unwilling to change coaches. Perhaps he learned from that? Or instead, perhaps Hexurke looks at the player composition as the reason for our one and dones? I really don't think Sully getting the axe if we lose the Isles is by ANY means a done deal. My preference is they win this f***ing series so the issue is moot.

You CAN’T keep Sully if they lose this series. He should have been fired after the Habs debacle.

You don’t deserve to run a team or own a team if you bring him back after that. But he was a good coach 5 years ago!

 

[CrosbyMalkin]

Jarry, that’s all.

Jarry was terrible today. All soft goals. If he plays like that the rest of the way we have no chance. Most of the goals had no screens and should of been easy stops. Goaltending is always key in playoffs.

 

[Kristopher Letang]

I don’t think Sully did a bad job today but I agree that if the Pens are eliminated in the first round he gotta go. Add the 2nd round to it depending on how they lose.

 

[wgknestrick]

Can only speak for myself, but I didn't expect Kapanen to be our most productive 5v5 player by a large margin.

NHL Stats

He should be on L1 getting the most minutes in preference of Rust.

 

[Sidney the Kidney]

man, it stinks to be a Pittsburgh sports fan rn...

But we won our first 9 series under Sullivan so everything's fine. Who cares what we do going forward under him.

 

[Honour Over Glory]

Is the real problem Sully though? Jarry not stopping at least one of the first three goals is not on him.

Jarry needed to be better, 100%. But the team defense has been a struggle all year and it's showing zero fixes so far.

Their scorers showed up. We needed ours to as well as the defense. Maybe it's a week long of no games Rust.

 

[vikingGoalie]

Of course Jarry is the number one reason we lost. but there are a few other things to consider.

What are we doing giving up *that* many shots and scoring chances against a team that is offensively challenged.
I mean i know OT and all, but 41 shots against? really?

Crosby was engaged in this game, he wanted to win this game you could tell.
Unfortunately Jake looks scared to take contact, and Rust didn't do much in this game. My point being Crosby did a lot of the heavy lifting those two need to help out.
KK was fantastic in spurts. But he was not engaged at that level the whole game. He wasn't alone, we looked like a team that hadn't played in a while at times.

Jarry needs to be better or we are done regardless.
But still the rest of the team can do better as well.

I thought Jarry would settle down after that 1st goal, and he did make some big saves. But one goalie analyst predicts success in the playoffs by measuring how often you make the saves you *SHOULD* make. It's a really good article. jarry failed on that measure today. 2 soft goals for sure and probably 3 if you are not kind.

I do not like this stat. Trotz/Islanders in 6 playoff series, they have won all the series (4) that they won the first game.... We go down 0-2 and we are done like dinner...

 

[Coastal Kev]

Sully........for reasons posted here way too many times.......

One dimensional team....good team....but one dimensional.....and they are maybe third or fourth best among playoff teams with that style.

They still can win a couple of series..... but they’ll need a couple of players to dominate.


Fire sully

 

[AuroraBorealis]

He should be on L1 getting the most minutes in preference of Rust.

Perhaps, yeah.

I would have Kap on PP1 on the left wall the entire year next season as well. At some point the player's earned the minutes...

 

[Honour Over Glory]

I agree to an extent. The problem is I'm not sure we would have even made the playoffs this year without Sullivan.

The regular season means more to me than to others I've noticed. Probably because I don't expect my teams to go far every year in a league that's built to encourage parity so much. How many viable contenders we have this year? Like 8? More?

Winning the division is already a big deal for me, especially with it being the hardest one of the four. I know it's an unpopular view though. Sullivan deserves some respect for that.

For me the team had a week off and most of the players back to practice. They had time to fix their defensive issues and came out with the same problems. Jarry might have needed to stop one or more but the defense needed to not look like a bunch of muppets either.

The last 3 seasons have been very Bylsma like....great during the season, flat in the playoffs. That's where my head is at.

 

[Snooki Stackhouse]

I thought the team did fairly well, but Jarry wasn't playoff caliber. Really disappointing, we'll see how they respond but it feels like ages since I got to watch this team perform well in the playoffs. Kind of disappointing too watching Fleury after Jarry today. I'm not trying to stir up that debate but it's something I dwell on when I watch vgk.

 

[Empoleon8771]

Geno's entire job if/when he comes back this playoff is get Kap the puck and be an asset on the PP. Asking anything more of the guy with his knee in shambles is setting him up for abject failure, and another season of Mark Madden screeching between fistfuls of greasy fried chicken like some kinda Invader Zim character.

Someone mentioning Invader Zim?

I have a coworker named Rocco and anytime I receive a skype message from him the "Rocco's modern life" theme flashes in my head

 

[CrosbyMalkin]

This looks identical to the series in 2019. Isles finishing most of their high danger chances. Pens not getting sustained pressure in the offensive zone. Not good. At all.

What game did you watch. Those goals they scored certainly didn't look like high danger chances to me. Those goals all looked soft. If we got average NHL goaltending this game doesn't go to OT and Pens win it easily and nobody is bitching. That was a pathetic showing by Jarry. If DeSmith was healthy he would get his shot after that effort. That might of been the worst goaltending of the year. A good highschool goalie stops most of those shots.

 

[Sidney the Kidney]

Of course Jarry is the number one reason we lost. but there are a few other things to consider.

What are we doing giving up *that* many shots and scoring chances against a team that is offensively challenged.
I mean i know OT and all, but 41 shots against? really?

Crosby was engaged in this game, he wanted to win this game you could tell.
Unfortunately Jake looks scared to take contact, and Rust didn't do much in this game. My point being Crosby did a lot of the heavy lifting those two need to help out.
KK was fantastic in spurts. But he was not engaged at that level the whole game. He wasn't alone, we looked like a team that hadn't played in a while at times.

Jarry needs to be better or we are done regardless.
But still the rest of the team can do better as well.

I thought Jarry would settle down after that 1st goal, and he did make some big saves. But one goalie analyst predicts success in the playoffs by measuring how often you make the saves you *SHOULD* make. It's a really good article. jarry failed on that measure today. 2 soft goals for sure and probably 3 if you are not kind.

I do not like this stat. Trotz/Islanders in 6 playoff series, they have won all the series (4) that they won the first game.... We go down 0-2 and we are done like dinner...

When is the last time Rust looked good with Crosby?

There have been games where Rust looks good individually, or Crosby looks good individually, or Crosby and Guentzel looked good as a duo. But I can't recall any games recently where the Rust/Crosby combo actually looked deadly as a pairing.

I kind of wish Sullivan would switch it up a bit. Put Rust with Carter and McCann, move Kapanen up with Sid and Jake. Or even bump Zucker up to play with Sid and Jake, put ZAR on the 4th line, and use Tanev on LW with Rust playing on RW.