Penguins Outlast Panthers, Prevail In Overtime To Earn Their Fourth Straight Win

It wasn’t conventional, but the Pittsburgh Penguins found a way to get it done on Tuesday against the defending Stanley Cup Champions.

Despite surrendering a 4-1 lead in the third period, the Penguins beat the Florida Panthers in overtime, 5-4, on Bryan Rust’s seventh career OT winner. Pittsburgh was able to survive Florida’s onslaught – they outshot the Penguins 41-16 – in large part because of a strong performance from goaltender Tristan Jarry.

Jarry got peppered in the third period, and despite allowing three goals – none of which he can really be faulted for – he helped the Penguins force overtime and kept them in the game all night long.

“I thought he stood tall in there all night long,” head coach Mike Sullivan said. “He battled, he made some key saves at key times throughout the course of the game. I thought ‘Jars’ was terrific tonight.”

Sullivan also stressed how important goaltending, from both Jarry and Alex Nedeljkovic, has been for them during this winning stretch of hockey.

“I think our goaltending has been critical to the stretch of games that we’ve put together at this point,” Sullivan said. “It’s hard to win in this league if you don’t get a timely save. There are good players on every team, and every team is going to get some looks. So, when your goaltender has the ability to make a timely save, I think it goes a long way.”

Defenseman Owen Pickering opened the scoring with his first goal in the National Hockey League, and the Penguins responded just one minute and 12 seconds later with a goal from Evgeni Malkin. Kris Letang added a goal in the third period, and Marcus Pettersson scored a goal-scorer’s goal at the beginning of the third:

Florida had a goal from Matthew Tkachuk in the first period, and after going down 4-1, they came on really strong in the third. The Penguins’ lead had evaporated midway through the period, as the Panthers scored three goals in four minutes and 32 seconds to tie the game, the last of which was a power play goal by Tkachuk on their first power play of the night.

The Panthers are a very good hockey team. They’re the defending champions. But this season-long story of the Penguins not being able to handle momentum swings and squandering multi-goal leads continues. Old habits that seemed to fade out during their win streak crept back in during the third period.

Make no mistake: Florida was the better team in this game. They outshot the Penguins, 41-16 and decidedly had most of the momentum throughout the game. The Penguins were opportunistic, and Jarry was just that good.

All that said, it was absolutely huge for the Penguins to get this overtime win, despite the circumstances. I think most would agree that this is a game that slips away earlier in the season.

Even Sullivan said that the mindset is completely different than it was when the Penguins were going through that rough stretch a month ago.

“What I liked about the group is that no one got rattled,” Sullivan said. “There was great conversation on the bench amongst the players, and we were just trying to push back, simplify the game a bit, play more north-south, play straight ahead, and compete. That was the feeling on the bench, that was the mindset, and what I will tell you is that it was very different maybe a month ago when we were going through that rough stretch.”

Here are a few other notes and observations from this game:

– Going back to Jarry for just a second, it really is amazing what good goaltending can do for a team. Early in the season – Joel Blomqvist aside – the Penguins simply weren’t getting that from their two veterans.

That’s no longer the case.

And this is true for Jarry in particular. Four of Jarry’s five best performances of the season have come over the Penguins’ last five games. In the past five games, Jarry has put up a .909 save percentage, and in those four performances, his save percentage is .919.

Jarry spoke about how the team’s response – as well as his – has been better during this stretch of games.

“I think it’s just staying with it,” Jarry said. “We’ve talked a lot about that over the course of the season so far, is just sticking with it. When they’re able to get those goals, just keep playing the right way. I think that’s a lot of what we’ve been talking about, and I think that reiterates what we need to do.”

The Penguins’ netminder might be turning a corner, and this is great news for the Penguins for an abundance of reasons.

– The early returns on Blake Lizotte and Philip Tomasino are very promising. The youthful energy is apparent, they’re both very smart players, and they each played a crucial role in Pittsburgh’s first two goals of the evening.

On the Malkin goal – which was the second of the game – Tomasino made a nice play near the offensive blue line to get the puck to Drew O’Connor. He immediately drove the middle alongside Malkin, and he guided O’Connor’s feed to Malkin with a no-look touch pass. Great, high-IQ stuff from him.

As for Lizotte? I said it after the last game, and I’ll say it again: This third line is really, really clicking for the Penguins.

They’re cycling. They’re forechecking hard. They’re winning puck battles. And Beauvillier and Lizotte have the ability to beat opponents to the puck and cycle using their speed, while Bunting has been a menace at the net front and below the goal line.

Two really good shifts by them led to the goals by Pickering and Letang. On Pickering’s goal, Lizotte hustled to beat Florida to the puck and poke it to Pickering, who shot the puck through traffic and scored.

Whatever they’re doing, it’s working, and they need to stick together. And whatever GM and POHO Kyle Dubas is doing to identify these younger players with upside who need a change of scenery… he needs to stick to that as well.

– Pickering continues to get better with each and every game he’s in.

I wasn’t surprised in the least when it was Jack St. Ivany who got optioned instead of Pickering. He’s been really solid for the Penguins, and he’s earned the opportunity to stay. Really cool to see him get his first professional goal right before his call-up and his first NHL goal not too long after. It’s been a great month for him.

“Obviously, it’s something you dream of from the time you’re three,” Pickering said of scoring his first NHL goal. “To be able to have that and to be able to get the win at the end of the night, is pretty cool.”

– Pettersson made a nice defensive play at the very beginning of the second period to stop a rush and knock Florida off the puck. He also blocked three shots in this game.

Along with Letang and Karlsson, he has been much better during this winning streak. He even scored that Bobby Orr/Paul Coffey-esque goal in the third period to give the Penguins their fourth goal, looking more like Letang and Karlsson there.

It’s huge for the Penguins in a lot of ways if his game continues to trend up.

– Speaking of blocked shots, Rickard Rakell’s work in the defensive zone continues to impress me.

He blocked a few shots tonight, but the most critical was one that led directly to Pettersson’s goal. He blocked a shot in the slot, chased the puck en route to the bench to get it ahead to Crosby, and got a well-earned secondary assist on the goal.

He’s just never out of position in the defensive zone, his reads are spectacular, and his general awareness is very good. I think, for much of Rakell’s tenure in Pittsburgh, his defensive work has gone largely overlooked.

But if I had to pick a Penguins’ forward – Noel Acciari aside – to be out there in defensive situations late in games while the team is holding onto a narrow lead, it would be Rakell.

I think he has more than earned some praise for his work in all three zones this season. He’s been one of the Penguins’ best players, hands-down.

– Speaking of Rakell, full rosters for the 4 Nations Tournament in February will be revealed on Wednesday.

Prospects Harrison Brunicke and Tanner Howe were already invited to Team Canada’s World Juniors camp. And, as of now, Sidney Crosby (Canada) and Erik Karlsson (Sweden) are the only Penguins to be named to 4 Nations so far.

It’s hard to say whether or not the Penguins will have any more representatives, but it feels like Rakell – and, perhaps, Pettersson – probably deserves a spot on Sweden’s roster. Blomqvist may have an outside shot at Finland for goaltending, and Rust may have a (very) outside shot at Team USA, especially given that Sullivan is the head coach.

If Blomqvist, or maybe Jesse Puljujarvi, makes Team Finland, the Penguins will officially have a representative for each team at the tournament.

We shall see. But, regardless, it will be nice to see NHL players back on international ice.