Penguins/Bruins Recap: Pens shutout in Boston

Pregame

Dan Muse hasn’t reacted via lineup changes to losses very frequently this season, however today changes on that front. All three of the top lines are mixed up a bit, Anthony Mantha moves up to the top line, Ben Kindel and Tommy Novak join Justin Brazeau on a new-look line, and perhaps most inexplicably of all Kevin Hayes is going to center Evgeni Malkin and Yegor Chinakhov. It’s the type of lineup that works and Muse looks smart, or it doesn’t and a lot of people will be questioning. Connor Clifton is back for his first game since December 20th and only his second since 12/14 after a long streak of healthy scratches.

The home Bruins are going with these lines and backup goalie Joonas Korpisalo on the back-half of their b2b.

First period

Tommy Novak goes to the box early. Boston appears to score later on but after further review Sean Kuraly punched the puck in with his glove and that isn’t allowed. No goal after all.

Brazeau takes a penalty, Pittsburgh kills it off without much trouble. Soon after, the Bruins score a good goal. Viktor Arvidsson chops a backhander while not even facing the net after a scramble that slips under Stuart Skinner.

The period comes to a close much like it did throughout; with a Penguin in the penalty box. This time Evgeni Malkin for high-sticking. Pittsburgh again stays strong down a player.

Decent first but the Pens were in penalty trouble too much and couldn’t get off to the start they were looking for. 1-0 Boston after one with an even 10 shots for each side.

Second period

Pittsburgh kills off the short carryover and gets a few looks at the Boston net but can’t beat Korpisalo. Kulak bobbles the puck and play goes the other way, Kulak has to hook Mark Kastelic to obstruct the breakaway and it’s yet another Penguin penalty to kill off, which they do.

The frequent trips to the penalty box continues, Kulak flipped the puck over the glass for the delay of game call with another job well done for the Pittsburgh PK.

The worm turns, Kastelic is given goalie interference penalty. Kastelic is none too pleased with Skinner for falling back in animated manner but given the situation it was bound to happen for the Penguins to finally get a shot with their power play for the first time on the night. It barely gets setup, though Brazeau does ring a deflected shot off the post shortly after the power play expires.

Both teams trade chances in the late stages, Sidney Crosby puts a couple of nice backhand shots that Korpisalo is right there to match.

Still 1-0 Boston with Pittsburgh either getting in their own way or failing to get a lot going through 40 minutes.

Third period

Brazeau is back to the penalty box early on, lucky for him the Bruins take a penalty 30 seconds into their power play to negate it.

The rest of the period trickles away without much going on. Pittsburgh pulls Skinner with about two minutes to go, they use the time with 1:24 remaining to regroup and give a breather. Doesn’t help and time ticks to 0:00 without the Pens finding a goal today.

Some thoughts

• Malkin hasn’t taken any faceoffs in the three games he’s been back from his shoulder injury, noticed in this one that Hayes got kicked out of the circle by the linesman and Malkin didn’t react even a little to move a muscle and let Chinakhov take it instead. Might speak to the status of that shoulder right now for him to be completely out for taking draws.
• It was a bad-good-bad situation with the Pittsburgh penalty kill today. The bad was taking five penalties in the first half of the game (to a curious 0 for the opponent). The good was the PK was very effective to only allow a handful of shots, very few of which were dangerous. The ultimate effect was bad to have 32% of the first 31 minutes of the game being spent as Boston power play time, making it impossible for the Pittsburgh skill players to get in a rhythm and get a lot going for themselves.
• There’s a stat floating around social media with the Pens record with Hayes out of the record (something like 15-4-2) and with him in the lineup (now 6-10-7). Similar, but opposite to the record with Lizotte being very good, there’s some correlation issues there, but maybe not as many. Everyone likes Hayes who is a good guy and all, not sure why he needs to be on the ice with Malkin’s line. Many a person got hung up as Hayes as “second line center” this game, which was technically his placement but with only 10:19 of icetime Hayes was the player with the least amount of action today. The line is attached to doesn’t matter so much as the fact that if he’s in the lineup at all it’s creating a disadvantage for the Penguins.
• It’s always startling how in the NHL there’s little difference between being in a groove turning into getting stuck in a rut. Last weekend at this time the Pens were coming off a win vs Detroit scoring four goals on Saturday and then a thrilling OT win against Columbus that produced five goals. Fast forward to this time, they score one against Calgary (hardly a defensive giant, and on their backup goal) and then have another backup goalie throw out a great performance today. Sometimes it do be like that with the highs and lows of a long season cresting and falling like waves in the ocean.
• The bummer is that Boston didn’t have that much going on, just four shots in the second period and four more in the third. It wasn’t like they were sitting on a 1-0 game, the Bruins were about in the same boat as Pittsburgh besides getting what turned out to be a fortunate break to score early on.

The Pens will head back home and try to shake off the doldrums they find themselves going through right now. They’ll likely need to do so soon since the mighty Tampa Bay Lightning are up next.