Rookie Defenseman Injured, Devils Shut Out Penguins, 3-0

The Pittsburgh Penguins played one of their best first periods of the season on Saturday against the New Jersey Devils.

Unfortunately, they did everything but put the puck in the net.

The Devils went on to defeat the Penguins, 3-0, in a game that was tightly contested until midway through the second period. From there, the Devils took over with their speed, forecheck, and aggressive defensive attack.

Stefan Noesen scored his 15th of the season with less than three minutes remaining off of a nice feed from Nico Hischier and as a result of a defensive breakdown by Ryan Shea and Rickard Rakell in front of Tristan Jarry.

Hischier added a tally of his own in the first half of the third period – at which point, the Devils had pretty much completely taken over the game – and Timo Meier potted the empty-netter within the final two minutes to seal the loss for the Penguins.

In their last 10 games against the Devils, the Penguins are 2-8 and have been outscored, 40-21. But it’s not like they played poorly for most of the game, especially against one of the top-three teams in the league.

“Seven out of their last eight games, they’ve given up less than 20 shots,” Penguins head coach Mike Sullivan said. “So, now, it’s eight out of their last nine games that they’ve given up less than 20 shots. They defend hard, they’re fast, they had the puck… For two and a half periods, I thought we competed hard and we were right there.”

Sullivan also credited Devils goaltender Jacob Markstrom, who stopped the mere 12 Penguins’ shots he faced, but made two key stops in the second period to keep Pittsburgh from opening the scoring – one of them being a ridiculous stop on Sidney Crosby.

Here are a few other notes and observations from Saturday’s loss to the Devils:

– Rookie defenseman Owen Pickering – who has been playing top-pair minutes alongside Kris Letang for the better part of the past couple of weeks – did not return for the third period because of what was later designated as an upper-body injury.

As such, the Penguins were forced to play the third period with five defensemen, and, actually, four for part of it, as Matt Grzelcyk left for a few minutes but returned.

I think it was evident in the latter half of the period that Penguins’ defensemen were a bit gassed since there were only two pairings. Not much they could do about that, unfortunately.

It would be very unfortunate for Pickering if this is something that keeps him out, so it’s probably good that the holiday break is approaching. He played a very strong game for the Penguins until he left it.

If he is out longer-term, however, the Penguins may need to make even more moves to bolster defensive depth with Marcus Pettersson already out of the mix for two to three more weeks.

– On that note, it’s a good thing Kyle Dubas traded for another left defenseman in P.O Joseph, who played his first game with the Penguins this season.

After Pickering did not return to the ice in the third period, he played on the top pairing alongside Kris Letang. And his coach was impressed with the game he had.

“I thought he played really well,” Sullivan said. “He’s mobile. That’s one of the faster teams in the league, but he’s mobile, he gets back to pucks, he’s poised with the puck, I thought he defended well with his stick… I thought he had a good game.”

– Another Penguin who had a strong game was Evgeni Malkin. He had an early breakaway that he lost a handle on – the ice was very bad all night, as the same thing happened to Jack Hughes later on – and he had his signature “gallop” for most of the evening.

Unfortunately, the Penguins just could not muster anything offensively. But he was very good for Pittsburgh tonight.

– Related to that, Sullivan put his lines in a blender during the third period, aside from the top line of Crosby, Bryan Rust, and Rickard Rakell – which has been dominant – and the fourth line of Noel Acciari, Blake Lizotte, and Matt Nieto.

Cody Glass and Michael Bunting started the game with Malkin, but they ended it on the third line with Philip Tomasino, while Drew O’Connor and Anthony Beauvillier played the third period with Malkin instead.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: the Penguins’ bottom-six has been much worse since Lizotte was moved from the third-line center position.

I simply do not understand why this has not been tried again since the loss to the New York Rangers. It was working. The line of Bunting, Lizotte, and Beauvillier was absolutely buzzing and acting as an energy line for Pittsburgh. They really had something there.

If Bunting is not going to play with Malkin, that should be the Penguins’ third line, and I don’t think it should really be much of a question. And I would not mind seeing Tomasino and Glass get some looks with Malkin for a few games, or even slotting Jesse Puljujarvi in to do so.

– That is now 29 games without a goal for O’Connor.

This is becoming a serious problem. Sullivan has mentioned taking the focus away from scoring for him. So have him center the fourth line. Have him focus on defense.

Aside from this option and the press box, I’m not sure there’s much else they can do at this point.

– Tristan Jarry was very good in this game and made several key saves in key moments.

He stopped 26 of 28 New Jersey shots, and he continuously made saves to keep the Penguins in the game. The Devils really turned it on in the second half of the evening, and he barely flinched.

They need to keep getting this level of goaltending from him.

– Although it would have been nice to win this one, this is probably the game the Penguins were most likely to drop out of the five to close out the calendar year. They are now 8-3-1 in their past 12 games.

However, it is worth noting that they are 1-6-1 against the Metropolitan division this season. And – you’ll never guess – three of their next four games are against the Metro.

They have a tilt against the Philadelphia Flyers on Dec. 23 – their last game before the holiday break – before a home-and-home against the New York Islanders on Dec. 28 and 29.

Even though they were bound to lose some games eventually, these next games are very important ones for the Penguins. Philadelphia currently sits just one point back of Pittsburgh, while the Isles sit two points back.

This is the point in the season where scoreboard watching starts to become prevalent. The trade deadline – as well as the second half – will come up fast.

So the Penguins need to rack up as many points as possible against the teams they are chasing and the teams that are chasing them.