Interesting game tonight. The Blue Jackets controlled the play for the majority of the game, especially in the second period, but sloppy play in terms of coverage, missed assignments, and discipline cost them against the equally undermanned Penguins. With Horton, Gaborik, Bobrovsky, Malkin, Letang, and others out of their respective lineups, a lot of the star power was missing. But the Penguins stars who were on the ice sure showed up, at least on the scoreboard, and the Jackets didn’t really come close to matching the Penguins offensively, despite having a large edge in shot attempts (71 to 40).
3rd Star: Corey Tropp
I’m really not a big fan of Corey Tropp, but he probably had his best game as a Jacket tonight. But that really isn’t saying much. Outside of his goal, he was mostly invisible. He managed to pick up a +3 as well, which looks lovely on paper, until you notice that Nikitin and Dubinsky’s goals were primarily scored by other lines, and Tropp just happened to be coming on the ice behind the play when the puck went in the net. As for his goal, yes it looked very pretty, but Boone Jenner put in the hard work to make it happen. A fantastic forecheck followed up by veteran level patience and a great pass allowed Tropp to come in alone, with speed on a 19 year old rookie. Any self respecting NHLer should be able to walk Olli Maata in that situation. The finish was fine as well, but Zatkoff really should have had it, considering he managed to get back across but he just couldn’t keep his pad flush. To me, the Dubinsky goal was much more impressive, as he beats Jussi Jokinen and Rob Scuderi one on one before finishing five hole.
2nd Star: Sidney Crosby
I actually thought Crosby had an off night tonight, which kind of goes to show how ridiculously talented he is. He had a great effort on his goal (although he owes Tyutin a beer), and his pass to Kunitz was crazy good, but he was otherwise held in check most of the night. His standard stats were all pretty (four shots, 61% on faceoffs, one goal, two assists, +2), but his Corsi percentage was a lowly 33% despite starting over 55% of his shifts in the offensive zone and winning the majority of his faceoffs. That’s the difficulty of playing someone stupid good like him, as a dumb play by Jack Johnson, a Tyutin-esque oopsie by Tyutin, and a tiny crack in the box on the PP and Crosby has a three point night, and all the great work to shut him down is for naught.
1st Star: James Neal
Neal was ridiculous tonight. Clearly the first star, as five points when your team puts up a five spot will usually lead you here. His shot release is just so good, as is his ability to find space. He’s a very good player aside from that, but those two elements of his game are what make him an elite player. I don’t see him as a product of Crosby/Malkin in the vein of Kunitz and Dupuis, but a legitimately dangerous scorer who’d put up good numbers playing with just about anyone (he scored at a 28 goal pace as a Star), but puts up crazy numbers with those superstars (scoring at a 44 goal pace as a Penguin).
Stud: Ryan Murray
Murray and Wisniewski were the primary players tasked with defending the Crosby-Kunitz forward pairing (their other winger flipped through various guys throughout the game). Along with the Umberger-Johansen-Foligno line, they did a very good job of holding that line in check, with their only even strength points coming against the Tyutin-Johnson pairing. There were a couple of times where Crosby tried to challenge Murray one on one, and he held his own each time. His stat line is fairly innocuous (no points, 1 shot, 1 blocked shot, two hits) until you get to the 24:40 time on ice, the highest on the Jackets, with James Wisniewski being the only other Jacket to play over twenty minutes. If you want to get fancy stat with him as well, he managed to put up a 69% corsi percentage, finished +1 in penalty plus-minus, and as mentioned earlier (and can never be understated) was matched up with and shut down Sidney Crosby most of the night.
Dud: Discipline
After the game I went back through and rewatched all of the penalties called against the Blue Jackets. Every single one of those penalties was a bad penalty. The list: Tropp – hacked out the Niskanen’s feet behind the Penguins net, Letestu – stick hooked in Neal’s midsection in the Penguin’s side of the neutral zone, Jenner – stick in Bortuzzo’s feet by the Penguins goal line, Comeau – stick in the feet and body of Bortuzzo through the Penguins zone and the neutral zone, Mackenzie – high stick on Adams in front of the Penguins net, Foligno – stick in Crosby’s feet deep in the Penguins zone. Notice something about all six of those penalties? Not a single one taken on the Jackets half of the ice. You just can’t do that. If you are getting your stick in opponents feet or parallel to the ice around their hands, you are going to get called more often than not. You just cannot take these kinds of penalties, not that consistently, and not against a deadly powerplay like the Penguins. Could the refs have let one or two of them go? Maybe. Could one or two of them brought a Penguin to the box with them for diving? Sure. But the Jackets were the ones initiating those situations, getting their sticks in places that often draw penalties, and doing it in locations of the ice where there was no immediate threat of a goal against. That is just unacceptable, and it really ended up costing the Jackets a win, as they were the better team for most of the game, and were downright dominant at even strength.
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