March 14, 2015
On the scene: Swing and a miss 45
Chris Kunitz pursues the Bruins’ Dennis Seidenberg behind the net Saturday afternoon. — GETTY
BY DEJAN KOVACEVIC
Sights, sounds and the scene at Consol Energy Center today …
• Once Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin both were lost to the Penguins on Saturday — see separate News/views entry on that for the latest — the 2-0 loss to the Bruins that followed probably seemed academic to most. But apparently not those inside the locker room.
“It’s not the first time that’s happened to us, so we knew we had to keep playing our game, keep going at them,” Brandon Sutter was saying afterward. “And now we’ve got another tough team coming in tomorrow in Detroit, and we’ve got to be ready to do it again.”
No one was taking any satisfaction in keeping a healthy Boston team close — the game wasn’t sealed until Zdeno Chara’s rink-length empty-netter — but Sutter nearly changed the scope of the day with a slick feed to Chris Kunitz on a late two-on-one that … oh, you saw it.
If not, slide ahead to the 3:20 mark below …
Players will whiff. It happens. But when it’s Kunitz and he’s coming off a West Coast trip in which he whiffed on no fewer than four golden scoring chances, two of those open nets, it raises more eyebrows than the norm. And it should. He’s not having the absymal season that some portray, but going from 35 goals to 16 is more free fall than slump, especially at age 35. Every once in a while, the old hands will show themselves, but more often than not anymore, they just look like old hands.
That’s not to lay this loss at Kunitz’s skates. But the larger trend is one that hasn’t gone unnoticed by the Penguins’ coaching staff, and it will be fascinating to see how, if at all, they react.
• No one stood out in this game, maybe not on either side, quite like Patric Hornqvist, who, as you’ll hear me tell him in this video, looked like he was singularly possessed to annoy Tuukka Rask …
• Thomas Greiss made 21 saves and gave up his lone goal to Milan Lucic from point-blank range after Rob Scuderi was late sliding over to cover. In all, another solid showing for the backup, but especially in the area of rebound control. That’s been a hugely inconsistent facet all season, and it did pop up again a couple times today, but he kept most in control.
• Johnston’s decision to scratch Derrick Pouliot was eminently predictable — and right, in my view — after his calamitous showing Thursday vs. Edmonton, but the coach also made clear today that, with seven defensemen in the fold now, the scratches will be based more on a rotation than on who messed up most in the previous game. That’s as it should be. And if you ask me, Kris Letang and Paul Martin could use breathers in advance of playoffs, too.
• Craig Adams had a crazy day. He was told he had to get dressed ‘about 30 seconds’ before the faceoff once it was determined Crosby was out. “It was a little tough. I’ve never done that before. But once I got a couple shifts, I felt OK.” The Penguins did abide by the rules, incidentally, specifically 7.1 on handling players assigned to start the game. Their card was switched in time for the referees to see it before the puck dropped.
• Letang played a wonderful game, really precise, but I feel compelled to add that Ian Cole was as solid as anyone on the back end. You can see a lot of why management liked him, as well as how deep the St. Louis corps is based on his ever getting scratched. Really nice find by Jim Rutherford and staff.
• Full column will follow the Wings game tomorrow.
