Column: Petulant Penguins show ugliest face

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Martin

Paul Martin and the Red Wings’ Justin Abdelkader scrap late in the first period Sunday. — GETTY

BY DEJAN KOVACEVIC

The NHL’s officiating is an abomination. Wes McCauley, amazingly, is even worse.

There. We done with that topic now?

No?

Well, I am. Because here’s the real rub from the Penguins’ embarrassing-on-all-levels 5-1 loss to the Red Wings today at Consol Energy Center: It’s the height of ignorance — and arrogance, for that matter — to think that they or anyone outside league HQ can do a blessed thing about it.

Seriously, what, if anything, are these guys thinking?

What was Chris Kunitz thinking?

The Penguins laughably went to a local paper over the weekend to explain that an iron deficiency has hampered his performance since Sochi. Presumably because it only takes a regular dosage of One A Day to avoid missing gaping nets. But the shield-free fact is that the coaching staff has been outright dismayed by Kunitz’s performance since November, and the behind-the-scenes criticism is that he failed to adjust his conditioning regimen to being 35 years old. Nothing else comes up.

Maybe Geritol is in order, instead.

Or whatever medicine might prevent an otherwise intelligent player from being the third man in an altercation to put his team short-handed, then flipping the puck in McCauley’s direction at the end of the first period in a flagrant attempt to send some playground-style message. Call McCauley overly sensitive. That’s fair. But the additional minor and 10-minute misconduct that followed handed the NHL’s No. 1 power play a third goal and the game.

The diagnosis for that is dumb.

Same applies for Steve Downie, accidentally or otherwise, tackling an official during a scrum.

Same applies for Brandon Sutter petulantly chasing Red Wings around the ice until leaving the refs no choice but to send him off for tripping.

Same applies for Kris Letang barking at McCauley with such vitriol that he rang up the rare trifecta of an unsportsmanlike conduct minor, a 10-minute misconduct and a game misconduct.

Same applies for Sidney Crosby blasting the puck down the ice after the officials made another miserable call in waving off a Christian Ehrhoff goal.

I’ll repeat: The officiating is the root cause, and it’s rancid.

But I’ll repeat even more emphatically: There’s nothing to be done about it. And if these Penguins are going to achieve anything more than a first-round playoff exit full of fist-shaking, righteous indignation, they need to be so much better at applying those emotions to the task at hand.

The players, to their credit, discussed this in the locker room after the game, from what I was able to gather. And Crosby, the captain, was front and center. That’s a positive.

If only Mike Johnston had stepped forward a fraction as much.

He began his press conference well enough, asked about his team’s poise: “Well, it’s uncharacteristic of guys like Kunitz and Letang to do that, so I’m not sure of the history with the officials or what’s gone on before. But certainly, I thought our guys got on edge way too quickly in the game. And certainly, penalties and 10-minute misconducts, that killed us today. Really, it was discipline throughout the team.”

It was all downhill from there, though, with this follow-up I asked:

Johnston later answered another reporter’s follow-up with a similar shrug.

OK, Coach, if it’s evidence you seek, better sit down for this …

Penalty-3

The numbers don’t lie. The Penguins’ 64 penalty minutes today pushed them well past Winnipeg for No. 1 in the NHL. And this from a team that’s instigated zero fights this year, so it’s not as if this is about intimidation. The Penguins are tied for fourth with 32 majors. And as for those 10-minute misconducts to which Johnston curiously claimed no knowledge, they’re No. 1 with 19, a whopping eight more than the second-ranked Jets, as well as No. 1 in unsportsmanlike conduct minors with 13, four more than the second-ranked Ducks.

So, no, it’s not some single-game issue to be dismissed lightly. The Penguins are the league’s least disciplined team by a massive margin, no matter how one measures it.

And make no mistake: This is on the head coach. Blame Crosby and the leadership, blame the old core that’s sung this song far too often, or just do as Johnston has done the past couple days and roll Downie and his NHL-high 199 penalty minutes under the team bus. But ultimately the man behind the bench is responsible for discipline. Always.

This, if you ask me, is Johnston’s greatest challenge. Which might be why he looked as much on the edge after the game as his players did during it.

The Penguins have the talent, the depth and enough of a style fit among their roster to work with the coach’s system. I believe that now as much as ever. They’ve also got the right system. And, I dare say after this weekend, they’ve got the competitive spirit, too. Need anyone be reminded, we’re a week removed from three of their most inspiring performances of the season out in California.

But this wasn’t a fluke, either, in the context of completely losing it. Fact is, these players still tend to pout and whine and fling their toys all over the crib anytime things don’t go the way they wish. I know it, you know it, the league’s other 29 teams know it, and you’d better believe the referees and league office know it. What’s more, all of those entities react accordingly.

This must change. As Crosby put it, “We’ve got to correct it. This can’t happen again.”

And it’s got to be Johnston who ensures it.

Yes, the players can take ownership, to an extent. My goodness, if this group did nothing more than emulate Patric Hornqvist, who competed twice as passionately this weekend as any of them yet never lost his cool, about 72 percent of all their problems would be solved. Of course, that will be hugely complicated if Hornqvist, who left this game with an injury that Johnston said “looked bad,” is out for any appreciable period.

The same praise can be offered for the poise of Ehrhoff, Nick Spaling, Blake Comeau, David Perron, Maxim Lapierre, Ian Cole, Ben Lovejoy and … well, looking at that pattern, maybe they just haven’t been around long enough to be fully afflicted.

Any good vitamins to prevent that?

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