Penguins lately have fallen into a lull of inconsistency
this point,” Sullivan said.
“We show signs of when we [get] our game together and we’re hard to play against. And then we show other signs where we won’t make the right decisions, we’re late to getting pucks, we don’t hang onto pucks and, as a result, we’re easy to play against.”
Sullivan pointed to a lack of consistency as the main issue.
The Penguins have, at points, shown flashes of the team they have the potential to be — coming back from a 2-0, third-period deficit Thursday against the San Jose Sharks, jumping on Colorado for an early 2-0 lead a week ago — but those games also have included more lackluster stretches.
They fell behind to the Sharks in the first place, and the Avalanche came back to win that game in overtime.
“We had moments that we were all right, and that’s kind of been the story of our first few games here,” center Matt Cullen said.
“We just haven’t been able to piece together solid efforts. We’ve had stretches where we’ve been pretty good, but then we give up stretches of really poor hockey.”
Even the first period Saturday against Nashville, which ended in a 1-1 tie, drew some positive reviews after the fact. Of course, it ended with another bugaboo of the Penguins this season — a poorly timed penalty followed by a powerplay goal the other way.
“That’s happened too often here lately,” Cullen said. “We’ve had some pretty good starts, and we’ve had some good first periods, but it seems like we’ve taken our foot off the gas and we just haven’t played the right way.
“I think that’s really bit us, and tonight was a good example of that. We let our foot off the gas and gave up way too much.”
The high points of this young season serve as a reminder of how powerful the Penguins can be when they do keep their foot on the gas. They just need to keep it there more often.
“It’s not so much that we don’t know how to play,” Sullivan said.
“It’s the consistency of it and because of the lack of consistency in our game, we’re getting inconsistent results.”