Sullivan shuffles lines; Sprong on fourth unit, Hagelin on second
with him.
“He’s the best player in the world.”
At times, with Hornqvist parked just outside the paint and Crosby and Guentzel grinding down low, it actually can get quite congested around the other team’s net. But other times, when Hornqvist actively finds soft spots and the Penguins can attack the net, that line is a lot to handle.
“He’s going to play the same way every night. He goes to the net hard, he plays with a lot of energy and he makes it tough on other teams,” Crosby said of the feisty Swede. “I think you realize pretty quickly that if you can get the puck to the net, a lot of the time he’s going to be there.”
Predictably, coach Mike Sullivan also downplayed the line-shuffling, which included putting speedy and responsible veteran winger Carl Hagelin back on a line with Evgeni Malkin and Phil Kessel and moving Zach Aston-Reese, their linemate at the start of training camp, to a fifth practice line.
“No one has their minds made up on what our opening lineup is going to be,” Sullivan insisted. “We’re just trying to put some combinations together and see what it looks like.”
But given that Sullivan already knows what that top line looks like — and that it usually looks good — it’s tough not to read into Hornqvist being teamed back up with Crosby and Guentzel, especially after Sullivan acknowledged Tuesday that Sprong was “up and down” in three preseason games.
Still, Sullivan seemed to stress the switch had more to do with their chemistry than Sprong’s preseason.
“We’re very familiar with Daniel’s game. Just because a guy has one good game or doesn’t have one good game, we’re not making decisions just based on that,” Sullivan said. “We’re looking at the big picture, what we think is best for our team and what we think is best for the individual player.”
Sprong, top prospect and a goal-getter at every other level, skated on the fourth line Tuesday alongside Matt Cullen and Riley Sheahan. While, if it holds, being on a line with two quick two-way centers would free him up offensively, it surely would mean fewer minutes for the 21-year-old, who last season scored 32 goals and dished 33 assists in 65 games in the AHL.
To his credit, Sprong said all the right things Tuesday. He had fun skating with Cullen and Sheahan in practice and is excited to work with them going forward. He was “happy with some areas of my game and disappointed with the other parts” in his three preseason games. And he says he is willing to put in the work needed to climb back up the depth chart.
The kid gets it: Crosby and Hornqvist have a history, and they clicked with Guentzel in the playoffs.
So, perhaps it shouldn’t be a surprise they were reunited, even if they all swear it was no big deal.
“We’ll see tomorrow if we play with each other or not,” Hornqvist said. “But it was fun practicing.”