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It’s not a stretch to say that the Penguins, perennial Eastern Conference contenders, have been one of the biggest letdowns through the first quarter of the 2015-16 National Hockey League.
A team featuring Sidney Crosby – arguably the most talented player of his generation – and Crosby’s long-time sidekick in Pittsburgh, Russian Evgeni Malkin, and defenceman Kris Letang, noted for being a scoring threat from the blue line, should be right at the top of the Metropolitan Division, the Eastern Conference and, indeed, the NHL itself.
Throw in a guy like Phil Kessel, the American sniper who was a casualty of the Toronto shake-up following Mike Babcock’s arrival there, and Pittsburgh were a team on everyone’s lips as far as being a serious threat to hoist Lord Stanley come the spring of 2016.
How could you not like them? Crosby, Malkin and Kessel leading the charge, and other talented second-tier skaters like Chris Kunitz, Patric Hornquist and Eric Fehr also on the roster.
A team with that sort of offensive talent – not to mention the Letang-led defence, and Marc-Andre Fleury in net – should be lighting up the scoreboard with regularity, and that was the expectation heading into the year. It was supposed to be nigh on impossible for opposition to stop the one-two-three punch of Crosby, Malkin and Kessel.
Instead, the Penguins have 33 points from 29 games this season, averaging a meagre 2.36 goals per game – meagre, when you consider their roster talent – and their power play numbers are down on a season ago.
They sit fifth in an increasingly competitive Metropolitan Division, owning the fourth-worst offence in the league. Only Toronto, Philadelphia and Anaheim have scored less goals than Pittsburgh so far in 2016, and none of the Penguins’ wins have been particularly convincing ones. If the season ended today, they would be on the outside looking in as far as a playoff berth is concerned.
Almost unbelievably, Crosby has just six goals and 13 assists for 19 points through 28 games played, with a minus-six rating. Kessel has nine goals and eight assists for 17 points over the same stretch as Crosby.
The best of the bunch is Malkin, with 13 goals and 13 assists. He’s a zero in plus-minus, which isn’t great for someone of Malkin’s stature. None of the stat lines for the ‘Big Three’ in Pittsburgh makes for pleasant reading if you’re a Penguin fan. Even their wins haven’t been particularly convincing.
Rumours abounded of a rift between Crosby and team owner and Hall of Fame legend Mario Lemieux – rumours that, it must be said, have been shot down by both parties – affecting the entire franchise. And this week, general manager Jim Rutherford publicly called out head coach Mike Johnston regarding a dispute over Johnston not giving much ice time to promising rookie Daniel Strong.
It’s never a good thing when a GM calls out his coach, and from that point forth it seemed like a fait accompli that Johnston, whose seat has gone from lukewarm to red hot in recent times, with no end in sight, would soon be out the door.
‘Soon’ turned out to be Saturday afternoon.
Rutherford announced that Johnston, who was 58-37-15 at Pittsburgh after replacing Stanley Cup-winning coach Dan Bylsma, has been relieved of his duties, citing “underachievement” as the reason for the change. Gone, also, is Johnston’s chief assistant Gary Agnew, the man chiefly responsible for the faltering power play unit.
Mike Sullivan, formerly an NHL head coach and more recently in charge of the Penguins’ AHL affiliate in Wilkesbarre-Scranton, takes over. At the moment, Sullivan might have the toughest job in hockey, and with a quarter of the season gone the turnaround needs to be swift if the Pens are going to reach the playoffs and, more importantly, be competitive once there.
That means advancing past the first round, rather than sneaking in and becoming cannon fodder for a team closer to the top of the tree.
I’m looking forward to seeing how Sullivan goes with an undeniably talented roster, and, further down the road, what happens if Pittsburgh’s troubles continue. The favoured way to kick-start an underachieving team is to change coach. They are often made scapegoats, and that may prove to be the case with Johnston, too.
If Pittsburgh’s struggles continue into the second half of the year, Rutherford has a serious situation on his hands, one that might cost him his own job. He’ll doubtless look at making changes to the roster he constructed.
Team ownership might have different ideas, such as cutting loose the man whom there isn’t a huge amount of love for among most Penguins fans. Particularly after he never made a serious run at snatching Mike Babcock up as coach last year when he announced a departure from Detroit, and especially given the two-time Olympic gold medal-winning coach had reportedly expressed an interest.
Suffice to say, all eyes will be on Pittsburgh as we head towards the midpoint of the 2015-16 season.
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