Penguins/Oilers Recap: Roughest neck around. Edmonton dummies Pens

Well, Joel Blomqvist did great at least.

Pregame

Minimal changes for the Penguins from last game, they flip the bottom-six forward group with Cody Glass and Jesse Puljujarvi and put Joel Blomqvist on the first half to the back-to-back and see what will happen.

The reigning Western Conference champions go with this lineup.

First period

Good hockey and fun hockey early. No penalties, lots of chances. Edmonton gets the better and more frequent of the chances, because, well, look at their team above and look at the Penguins’. Joel Blomqvist is very good through it all.

Shots end up 19-5 Oilers. It didn’t feel that lopsided to the eye, but that might be a plain poor observation since Moneypuck had the expected goal count at 2.23 – 0.60 through 20 minutes. But for as bad as the future would get, this contest was at least 0-0 at the first break. No one would certainly think the Pens the better of the teams but it wasn’t a complete joke…Yet.

Second period

If one could be as kind as we were above to give the Pens the some benefit of the doubt of being at least be in the same zip code as their opponent in the first period, that illusion completely fell away at the start of the second.

Edmonton recorded the first 10 shots of the period. It didn’t feel like Pittsburgh’s skaters even had 10 total touches by that point. Marcus Pettersson saved a goal on one sequence, but put the puck bad into trouble. Blomqvist made the most of the help by stopping the follow up.

The Pens wouldn’t get their first shot of the period until Anthony Beauvillier had a routine one with 11:22 to play that was only memorable since it was the first one.

In one of the few times to this point where the Pens get in the offensive zone and have the puck their third line puts together a good shift. Lars Eller hits a post. It doesn’t look like they’re good enough to try a rope-a-dope strategy but there’s the faintest hint of life for the first time. Puck goes back the other way and Leon Draisaitl finally cracks Blomqvist. Shots are 34-13, Moneypuck had EDM up to 3.6 expected goals before they could get their first one by the netminder. It took 33 minutes and a perfectly placed shot but the Oilers are finally on the board.

The Oilers get a long shift of zone time, tire out the Pens’ players. Looks like they’re on a power play, but they’re not. Finally they work the puck around to Evan Bouchard and he rips a shot in. 2-0 with 2:25 to play.

But wait, the Pens’ video team flags the play for offsides. It’s a very close call that requires freeze frame and a magnifying glass and the refs can’t see that Oil were off upon entry. Pens take a delay of game by virtue of losing the challenge.

They kill it off at least but head to the locker room in the deepest 2-0 hole you’ve ever seen. Shots are 39-17.

Third period

The Oilers blew a 2-0 third period lead in their last game, but they’re not going to do that for a second game in a row. Bit of a broken play ends up in the Pens’ net courtesy of Ryan Nugent-Hopkins hitting the post and going in. 3-0 only 16 seconds into the period.

To add insult to injury, the Pens can’t find a goal in the teams they get to good scoring positions. Stuart Skinner is just as good as Blomqvist on this night (just tested way less). But Skinner stones Erik Karlsson from point blank range and then denies Noel Acciari on the rush off a one-timer.

Edmonton is on the power play due to an Evgeni Malkin interference call, they screen Blomqvist and score again. 4-0.

Pettersson sent Viktor Arvidsson into the wall with a dangerous check. For some reason the refs don’t penalize this.

So to Pettersson’s credit to his honor but to the detriment of his face he obliges Darnell Nurse with a fighting major with just over 5 minutes left in a blowout game to make up for it. Nurse treats Pettersson literally like the Oilers have treated the Pens figuratively all night and beats the hell out of him.

Luckily no more goals are scored, though the Pens gave up a shorthanded breakaway as the clock was running out so it’s not like they weren’t doing their part to make things even worse.

Some thoughts

• Edmonton good, Penguins not that good. That’s it, that’s the thoughts tonight.
• But if you’re looking for more, this is just the way it is. This is what Pittsburgh used to do to the random league-average-or-worse teams for the better part of 15 years from 2007-22 to use superior talent to control a game and dummy teams. What goes up and all.
• Joel Blomqvist, at least! He was great, made some huge saves and gave his team (technically) a chance and extended how long they were in the game well beyond any reasonable level a goaltender should have.
• In some ways, reminded me of the Marc-Andre Fleury debut for a talented young goalie doing really well in front of a team that was really bad. 46 saves on 48 shots that night for the Flower in a 3-0 loss to LA (they scored an empty netter to finish it off). The Pens only mustered 11 shots in this game, but hanging your hat on performing a little better than the 2003-04 Pens is a low bar indeed.
• Cody Glass got injured on the sequence leading up to the second Edmonton goal and did not return to play another shift for the rest of the game.
• Pettersson owed a fight after making a bad hit, but the wisdom of a guy who doesn’t know how to fight (and is the only decent actual defender on the team) fighting someone that does know how to fight is lacking. It’s 2024 now, not like he can attack you these days and force the confrontation! Didn’t seem like the time or the place late in a blowout. If Nurse was still mad the next time they play, go for it then. Pettersson won’t be feeling great waking up in the morning but hopefully no worse for wear.
• If I told you before the game that the Pens would break Connor McDavid’s 30-game scoring streak vs. Eastern Conference opponents tonight, you might feel pretty good about the outcome (or maybe suspect I was playing some cruel trick on you, in which case you would have been correct). So, hey, at least the Pens held McDavid off the board, he usually roasts them.
• Lots of teams are gonna be second best on the night when on the ice with the Oilers. But add this game into the Pens’ performances against other very good teams in the Rangers (6-0 loss) and the Hurricanes (4-1 loss) and it’s not a pretty picture against those top 5-ish level teams this season, with the potential to get ugly that is coming true a little too often (which is to say, it’s getting ugly every single time so far). There’s plenty more big picture thinking you could do about what that might mean for future prospects of this club and it’s certainly nothing encouraging, but then again it’s not like the Oilers don’t always beat the Pens like a drum these days. Might as well refer back to thought No. 1 above and move onto the 10th game of the season.

That next one will come up quickly, there’s one more game to go on this road trip and it’s tomorrow night. We’ll see if the Pens want to show up and can be bothered to show any interest or effort in Vancouver. If not, you can bet how it will end.