Injuries, illness put Penguins at disadvantage
It’s hard to be mad at the Penguins. It wasn’t a fair fight against the New York Rangers from the start. The Penguins were missing too many key players because of injuries and illness. The surprise wasn’t that the powerful Rangers closed out their first-round playoff series Friday night with another 2-1 overtime win in Game 5. The surprise was that the Penguins won a
game.
“Are we a better teamwith those guys?” defenseman Rob Scuderi asked, referencing his missing teammates, notably Kris Letang and Christian Ehrhoff. “Sure, we are. But that’s not the hand we were dealt. That’s hockey, sometimes.”
It’s a lot easier to feel sad for the Penguins. Another year of the Crosby-Malkin era has come and gone. The franchise has had— in theory, anyway— two of the best players in the world but made it as far as the Eastern Conference final just one time in the past six seasons. This was the third time in those six years that the Penguins were eliminated in the first round. It’s fair to wonder if Sidney Crosby and EvgeniMalkin will win another Stanley Cup to go with the one from2009. It’s fair to wonder howmany more chances they will get together with the Penguins.
“I thought we left it all out there,” Crosby said just moments after Carl Hagelin’s goal at 10:52 of overtime ended the Penguins’ season.
It wasn’t enough. Crosby andMalkin didn’t do nearly enough to help their cause. When a teamis paying two players at the same position such a high percentage of the salary cap, those players have to be transcendent. Crosby wasOK. Malkin was mostly awful, although he played hard and had scoring chances in the second and third periods Friday night. He finished with six shots on goal after getting just one in Game 4 and none in Game 3.
Crosby was better than he was in the playoffs a year ago when he had one goal in 13 games. He scored twice in the Penguins’ win in Game 2 and was a force at other times. But he was held without a point in Game 4 and had just one assist Friday night. Not exactly Lemieuxlike.
Malkin did nothing, those brief late flashes Friday night aside. He was held without a point in the five games. Going back to the regular season, thatmakes 15 games without a goal for Malkin and 10 without a point. Forget Lemieux-like. That’s not even Scuderi-like.
Speculation isMalkin was hurt, that he played the series with a bad back. He must have been hurt. There is no other way he could have played that poorly.
And you wonder why the Penguins scored just eight goals in the five games?
They had no chance getting no goals and no points fromone of their superstars.
Even if Crosby and Malkin had been at their best, it might not have been enough against the Rangers. “They’re a [heck] of a team,” Patric Hornqvist said. The Penguins were not, not without somany quality players. Their hope for a long playoff run ended when Letang went downand out with a concussion March 28 in a game against the Arizona Coyotes. Like Crosby and Malkin, he is irreplaceable on this Penguins squad. The Rangers were the much quicker team. Letang would have helped defuse that advantage because of his speed. The Penguins’ No. 1 power play went 0 for 13. Letang would have helped there, too.
There were other Penguins injuries, to be sure. Pascal Dupuis, out since mid-November because of a blood clot, would have provided more offense on one of the top two lines than Chris Kunitz (three goals in 38 games) and David Perron (no goals in 17 games). Olli Maatta, out since early December with a shoulder injury, and Ehrhoff, out with a concussion since March 24, would have been a significant upgrade on defense. No team is good enough to beat the NHL’s best club without three of its four top defensemen.
It’s a shame because Marc-Andre Fleury played well in the series, good enough to get the Penguins to the second round if he had had even a little help. It still seems hard to believe he allowed just 11 goals on 150 shots in the five games and had one win to show for it. He was the losing goaltender in four 2-1 defeats. What were the odds of that?
It’s hard to say Rangers goaltender Henrik Lundqvist was better than Fleury in the series, although he was terrific Friday night with 37 saves. But the Penguins made things easy on himin the first four games, averaging just 23.5 shots per game. There were long stretches in those games when he barely broke a sweat.
In the end, Fleury couldn’t win the series by himself. This loss was on Crosby and especially Malkin. Just as much, it was on the guys who couldn’t play.
“I don’t think we could have done anything more,” Hornqvist said. “This [stinks] right now. It’s just an empty feeling.”
Imagine how Letang felt. Instead of being with his teammates, he was dressed in a business suit outside the locker room, talking with Nathalie Lemieux, Mario’s wife. It was hard to say who was consoling whom. Apicture is supposed to be worth a thousand words. That picture said it all about the Penguins’ season being over.