Penguins/Rangers Recap: NY overcomes Shea’s rebellion, downs Pens

Two goals from Ryan Shea aren’t enough for the Penguins to win

Pregame

The Penguins flip left wings on the second and third lines from yesterday’s game, insert Ryan Shea for Vincent Deshairnais after the latter’s very bad no good day and go with Joel Blomqvist in the net.

First period

The Penguins are digging early. Nice early work from Danton Heinen and Evgeni Malkin around the net, routing out the puck. Eventually Cody Glass fans on a shot and Malkin is able to lean and poke it in. Pittsburgh was harder on pucks and wanted it more early to win battles like the ones in this sequence.

Matt Rempe tries to run Matt Grzelcyk through the boards but somehow is given a two-minute penalty after video review. If that kind of hit from that kind of player isn’t dealt with harshly then what are we even doing. Grzelcyk would not return to the game.

The Rangers find an equalizer before the intermission. The Pens’ have to back off on the PK for the zone entry and Joel Blomqvist can’t stop a Will Cuylle shot from the left side. Probably one the netminder would want back, and it wouldn’t be the last. 1-1.

Good first for the Pens, they outshoot NYR 12-5 and generally controlled play. Troublingly, that advantage in play did not result in a lead after 20 minutes.

Second period

It’s all Pittsburgh all the time, plenty of zone time, puck control, o-zone passes looking for that lead. Thanks to some nice saves from Igor Shesterkin, it doesn’t happen in this period. The Pens outshoot NYR by a 19-4 margin in the second, but it’s the Rangers who score the only goal when P.O. Joseph falls and J.T Miller races around him. Miller looks off the pass and fires a shot right by the ear of Blomqvist. 2-1 NYR.

Cruel period for the Pens. That go-ahead goal was this close, but they just couldn’t find it, and then in typical 2024-25 Pittsburgh fashion find a way to fall behind despite playing so well for 90% of the time.

Third period

The Pens open the third strong and it turns into the Ryan Shea game for about three minutes. Shea scores twice to push Pittsburgh to a 3-2 lead. The first one comes with traffic in front but is a nice shot from the middle of the ice around the tops of the circles.

The second Shea goal was a lucky break and gave short-lived hope that the Pens were being rewarded for their efforts of out-playing the Rangers to this point. Shea tossed a shot to the net that was headed well wide before it hit K’Andre Miller on the back. That deflection caused the puck to skip right into the net. 3-2 Pens.

The Rangers find an answer less than a minute later to tie the game back up. Jimmy Vesey eludes the defending of Joseph and fires a hard shot in. If you want to play winning hockey either the defender or goalie has to get a piece of this.

A bit later a similar play happens from the middle of the ice. This time it’s Shea who can’t sweep the puck away from Adam Fox. Fox does well to keep control of it and fires a shot that leaks through Blomqvist. Ouch. 4-3 NYR.

Pittsburgh’s push for a late-game goal doesn’t work out. Miller scores an empty netter for his second goal of the game with a handful of seconds left to seal the Ranger victory.

Some thoughts

• One of the more amazing stats this season is that the Penguins are just 4-13-3 in games when tied after the first period, adding a loss with today’s result. They’re a much better 8-11-4 when trailing after one! Somehow, someway when this team is even they always find a way to fall apart later on in games. Being behind is somehow preferable to shift the mentality into chase mode a little earlier.
• A big reason for that is the combined second period scores of Pens’ game this year is 56-70 in favor of the opposition. It’s 54-62 in the third (once taking away empty net goals). That second period has been the house of horrors for Pittsburgh this year, as it also was today the middle period was the only one where Pittsburgh got out-scored (again removing ENG).
• The power play going 0/3 is a hard one to swallow today too. They got plenty of zone time but only three total shots on goal. It felt close to breaking through but never could quite get there.
• It’s a shame the result soured Shea’s game. Playing his first game since Jan. 27th and only his third in calendar 2025, Shea managed to go from one to three career NHL goals. He’s been on the outside looking in for much of the season, playing only 23 of the team’s 58 games so far. Big day for him personally to stay in consideration to keep his name in the lineup.
• Grzelcyk getting rammed through the end wall two weeks before the trade deadline is a tough beat. Hopefully he’s not too bad, there was no substantive update on him after the game beyond being evaluated for an upper body injury.
• Malkin put up a goal and an assist, encouraging to see him hit the ground running after his injury layoff. No problems there and he’s making something out of playing with guys like Heinen and Glass which is pretty impressive.
• Crosby had 5 SOG and eight total shot attempts, this was the first game in a while where he was uncorking good shots without looking terribly limited or deferring to a pass in a while since his arm injury.
• When Blomqvist gave up his fourth goal of the game, Moneypuck had NYR’s expected goal total at 2.04, which felt very fair. He needed to make two more saves than he did today. The defense wasn’t great on some of those sequences but the Pens suppressed a lot overall and didn’t ask their netminder for too much by only allowing 15 shots. Giving up four goals in that situation isn’t a recipe for winning.
• On the other side, the Pens generated over 4 xGF but Shesterkin did well to hold them at bay. There’s no doubt he was the stronger of the goalies, saw a lot of work and did enough to keep his team in. The Rangers didn’t have much business winning this game but their goalie kept them hanging around and eventually they made the most of that opportunity.

Somewhat of a nice response for the Pens, but a frustrating result to see this game slip away. In the big picture that might not be a terrible thing but today is just another game in a big pile this season that was right there for the taking that they couldn’t get the job done. The rivalry with Philadelphia renews this week with two games coming up starting on Tuesday night.