On verge of title, Penguins trying to keep cool

PITTSBURGH — When the puck drops for Game 5 of the Stanley Cup Final on Thursday night, the Pittsburgh Penguins will be doing their best to not dwell on the big, silver trophy waiting somewhere in the bowels of Consol Energy Center.

One more win against the San Jose Sharks will end with the Penguins hoisting the Stanley Cup, but Penguins coach Mike Sullivan said Tuesday he trusts his players to keep their focus on the ice.

“I think I trust our leadership,” Sullivan said on a conference call. “We’ve got some guys in there that have this in perspective, that have been through similar experiences in the past.”

Five players — goalie Marc-Andre Fleury, defenseman Kris Letang, and forwards Chris Kunitz, Evgeni Malkin and Sidney Crosby — were on the Penguins’ last Stanley Cup team in 2009. In that final, they did not have the luxury of a 3-1 series lead and had to win back-to-back elimination contests in Games 6 and 7 against the Red Wings to claim the title.

Center Matt Cullen is the only other Penguin to win the Stanley Cup. He did so in 2006 with the Carolina Hurricanes, also in a seven-game series against the Edmonton Oilers.

“I think our guys are very grounded,” Sullivan said. “They understand the challenge in front of us. We just have to focus on that one game, and we’ve got to bring our very best for that one game. That’s all that we can control.”

Sullivan said his team will work to eliminate the “noise” around the team over the next two days, as they have done over the past few months. He credited that short-term focus with the Penguins’ success, not only in the playoffs, but down the stretch in the regular season as well.

“Certainly the most important game is the one right in front of us. That’s where we have to have our focus,” Sullivan said. “We need to have that laser focus for that one task at hand.”

Thursday night, they’ll try to direct that focus on the Sharks, not the Stanley Cup that could join them on the ice at the end of the night.

“Our players are well aware, just based on their comments after the game last night, excited to be in the position we’re in, but by no means do we think that we’ve accomplished what we’ve set out to do,” Sullivan said. “We still have a lot of work ahead of us.”