So a 4-3 game one loss is in the books. I guess you could call it a moral victory, although I would call it a missed opportunity. Marc-Andre Fleury was as shaky as advertised in the first half of the game, the game was more or less even at 5 on 5, but the Penguins powerplay and a few key mistakes brought down the upset attempt. I’m only going to breakdown two goals completely, as for the most part there wasn’t a whole lot of hidden elements in most of the goals. The Jackets opened the scoring with a huge individual effort from Brandon Dubinsky (although Jack Johnson scored the goal). The Penguins followed that up with a Jussi Jokinen goal that resulted from Sergei Bobrovsky misplaying the puck, Fedor Tyutin misplaying the puck, Derek MacKenzie letting his man go (probably thinking Tyutin was going to corral the puck), and Bob being a little out of position after scrambling back into the net. The Jackets grabbed the lead right back on a Mark Letestu powerplay goal. I like the puck movement on that goal, really spreading out the zone and forcing Fleury to move. The goal ultimately came off a scramble that saw Fleury needing to move across the net. They have to keep that up. MacKenzie made up for his earlier gaffe, with a great individual effort on the PK to take the puck from Kris Letang and beat Fleury on a breakaway. The Penguins made it 3-2 on a powerplay goal by their second unit, off a great tip by Beau Bennett. I would have maybe liked to see Dubinsky pick up Bennett as he comes across there, but no major mistakes on that goal.
Matt Niskanen, from Evgeni Malkin and Sidney Crosby to tie it up 3-3
In the series preview, I talked quite a bit about the Penguins most dangerous look on the powerplay, and this here gives us a great look at it (albeit with Matt Niskanen in Kris Letang’s spot). So take a look at that goal, watch for the formation with Crosby and Malkin playing with it on the half-wall/point, watch for the off puck movement Niskanen, Kunitz, and (especially) Neal. Then we’ll break it down point by point
The Jackets are in good shape here. Tyutin and Savard are in good spots, Letestu has Niskanen’s shooting lane, MacKenzie is supporting, taking away the pass to Crosby and able to jump on Neal if Niskanen tries to go there. This is off a faceoff, so I am guessing there was a set play being run (judging by Neal’s movements) that didn’t pan out. With all his options gone, Niskanen sends it over to Malkin to move into their standard powerplay formation. This is where the Jackets rotations differ from some other teams. When the Jackets are playing a team with a dangerous point man (in this case Malkin), they tend to have the high guy chase the puck and stay up high (see Letestu’s arrow for his movements), with the lower forward moving to fill the space on the other side (see MacKenzie’s arrow for his movement). In general, usually each forward takes their own side of the ice, and if the puck moves d-to-d, the forwards pivot. This creates a small gap where Malkin would have free time. Giving Malkin free time is bad.
So here we are, just a couple seconds later. Niskanen passed the puck to Malkin, who sent it to Crosby. While this was going on, Niskanen moved down to be the weakside one-timer, Neal cut through the box to hopefully cause some switching panic (didn’t work, the defense kept their spots fine), and Kunitz set up camp in front. Letestu pressured Crosby, which is fine, but I think he went a little too hard at him. There are some guys you can pressure like this and cause a turnover. Sidney Crosby is the best hockey player in the world, he isn’t one of them. I’d like to see Letestu pressure him hard, but not so hard as to get himself caught like this. Contain, more than press. The bigger mistake here is having MacKenzie so low. I know what he is going here, as if he is higher up on Malkin, then Crosby has a passing lane to Niskanen backdoor. This is what I talked about in my preview. Forget about the passing lanes a little bit here. If Letestu is a little softer on Crosby, that makes the pass straight to Niskanen a little harder. Tyutin is high on Neal, and could probably jump that pass if need be. Savard is also in a position to get into Niskanen’s shooting lane pretty quickly. I would much rather prefer relying on those three things to stop Matt Niskanen then give Evgeni Malkin all of that space.
Here is where the Jackets need to be a little more flexible in their rotations up high. I think Letestu was trying to come back across to Malkin, and DMac didn’t want to come up too high out of position. So he tried to play goalie, which is stupid for so many reasons. First, he’s not a goalie. Second, it’s Evgeni Malkin, you aren’t going to block his shot from that far away, in that stance. Third, you are just screening Bob. Fourth, you are leaving all kinds of passing lanes open, and not even putting any pressure on Malkin. I’d rather see MacKenzie come out much harder on Malkin, with Letestu dropping back down to the second layer to cover for the space MacKenzie just moved out of.
Remember when I talked about forgetting the passing lanes? Yeah this is the opposite of that. Because the forwards got so thoroughly beat (Letestu is defending no one, and MacKenzie is attempting to defend the passing lane to Crosby, but failing hard at it), the defense now have four Penguins to worry about. So they try and play it safe and take away passing lanes. I’d rather they worry about shooting lanes here. If Savard goes for the shot block, the puck doesn’t beat him five hole. But that probably opens up a passing lane inside, which is why I’d rather see Tyutin tighter to Kunitz and take him away. Letetu has absolutely no excuse to have let Crosby beat him back low like this. And MacKenzie should be a little further out, ready to defending either Niskanen walking to the middle of the ice, or a pass back to Malkin for a one-timer.
And that is really all she wrote. Niskanen shot it through Savard and Bobrovsky’s legs. Weak goal by Bob, but a lot went into allowing that shot to hit the net. Better work by the forwards up front would have allowed Savard and Tyutin to concentrate on the shooter and the netfront guys. This would have allowed Savard to sell out on the shot without opening up other dangerous options. Savard going down to block the shot instead of trying to half block it and not allow a pass, means it doesn’t even get to the net. Look, defending the Pens on the PP is not easy. Every player on the ice can beat you, and the slightest hiccup can allow the space needed for them to beat you. The Jackets really need to tighten this up next game.
Brandon Sutter from Beau Bennett and Paul Martin to give the Penguins a 4-3 lead
Ugh ugh ugh. This is ugly from start to finish. There is one person primarily responsible for the scoring chance here, and that is Boone Jenner. But first, let me just say that Boone played a fantastic game for the most part, but his role in this goal is more or less unforgivable. So watch the above clip, as Jenner turns the puck over at the Penguins blueline, Jack Johnson is off in la-la-land, Jenner and Skille collide and take each other out trying to get back, and Bob lets in a softie.
So we start here. Boone Jenner has three options, all highlighted in red arrows. Orpik is tight on Johansen, Martin has stood Jenner up at the blueline, and Stempniak is providing back-pressure. Martin and Stempniak take away option four, which is carry the puck in. If Jenner doesn’t get rid of it right here, it’s a turnover. The safest option would be to flip the puck deep into the far corner. It then becomes a race between Skille and Orpik to go get it. Maybe the Jackets get it, maybe they don’t but it’s deep in Pittsburgh territory, and the Pens can’t score from there. The slightly less safe, but much better option would be a soft dump past Martin up the wall. Johansen has speed, and Martin doesn’t. Joey gets to that puck first 99 times out of 100, and Orpik probably goes with him. This would allow Jenner to cut back to the slot, Skille to go hard to the net, and Martin and Stempniak would be scrmabling to switch and figure out who has who. Confusion is good. Forcing teams to switch up which player someone is covering, or which side of the ice they are on is good. Switching causes mistakes. Bennett, the next guy back is in a terrible position should this play out. Joey would have the puck on the half-wall, Jenner would be in the slot, Skille at the backdoor, and Johnson would be able to jump into the play. Martin would probably take Jenner, although he may try and hightail it over to Skille and hope Stempniak picks up Jenner. There is no way Bennett gets over to Johnson. That would have likely resulted in a scoring chance.
Instead, Jenner chose option three, the most dangerous play, and not even the one presenting the most reward. Best case scenario here is the Jenner gets it on Johansen’s stick, and Joey can get it over to Skille before Orpik or Stempniak take it away from him. That would have been a scoring chance too, but it means two high risk, difficult plays, with multiple defenders there need to go in the Jackets favor. Not likely. So Jenner forces the pass, Martin bats down his saucer, and away we go the other way.
The pucks bounces out to Beau Bennett, who sends it right over to Sutter. A couple things to see here. First, Skille and Jenner both try and curl hard to get back and provide some help. It goes poorly for them, as they collide, take each other out, and are forced to just watch what happens. Bennett and Sutter play it well, but don’t really do anything special other than immediately get hauling ass towards the Jackets end. Tyutin is in great shape. Jack Johnson. Jack Johnson. Jack Johnson. Jack Johnson. Oh man. What. I don’t even really know. This is a 3-3 game. The puck hadn’t even gotten into the Penguins zone. And for some reason Johnson is way up ice, with two Penguin forwards behind him, way out in no man’s land, and rushing up ice full speed. Like, his brain just had to have been completely shut off. “Puck go that way, I skate hard.” Honestly, he can’t be thinking anything more than that. Maybe he watch the highlights of his goal earlier in the game and wanted to do that again. I know Jack, scoring goals is fun, especially when they are beauties. Guess what? YOU ARE A DEFENSEMAN! There was not one ounce of defense, or even thoughts of defense by Jack Johnson on this play. Brutal, terrible, unforgivable. This play should have been a two on two, which likely would have resulted in Sutter getting the line, curling towards the boards and waiting for help. Instead it is a half ice two on one.
Now Tyutin plays this perfectly. He takes away the pass for as long as he can. Then once they are in tight enough that he can play both, he lays out, which takes away the pass and a shot on the ice. Oh hi Jack Johnson, thanks for joining us, and doing absolutely nothing (well I guess his presence means Bennett can’t slow up). At this point, everything looks fine. Bob is way out and playing the angle. He’s in the right position, the shot isn’t a bomb, he doesn’t pick a corner, he pretty much just gets it on net. But it goes in. That was a very stoppable puck that should have been had. Unfortunately, Bob muffed it, the puck went in, and the Penguins won.
Bonus: Jack Johnson, from Brandon Dubinsky and Paul Martin’s Jockstrap
I have very little to say about this goal, but want to include it so this wasn’t all negative. Dubi blocks a shot, quickly skates the puck out of the zone, removes Paul Martin’s underwear with a dirty move, makes a perfect pass just before the backchecking Crosby gets to him, and Johnson has a damn near perfect finish. Let’s hope to see this a few more times tomorrow night.
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