February 13, 2015
Podcast: Rapid fire on 970 ESPN w/ Todd
BY DEJAN KOVACEVIC
Here’s the podcast of my weekly rapid-fire segment on 970 ESPN Pittsburgh with David Todd, this covering all kinds of Penguins stuff and some Pedro Alvarez, too.
Pittsburgh Penguins
February 13, 2015
Friday Insider: Steelers veering away from vets
Troy Polamalu and his secondary mates share a moment late in the playoff loss to the Ravens. — GETTY
BY DEJAN KOVACEVIC
Roundup of a lot of randomness from a lot of time around our teams …
• The Steelers have absolutely, positively not made up their minds about any of their four classic veterans — Troy Polamalu, James Harrison, Brett Keisel and Ike Taylor — but that fact alone, coupled with what I’ve learned this week is their intention to keep other players at those same positions, is making a return look immensely unlikely.
And I mean for any of the four.
Situations can change, of course, but the current defensive priority on the South Side, based on conversations I’ve had this week, is twofold:
February 12, 2015
Penguins 5, Senators 4, SO
BY DEJAN KOVACEVIC
Getting ready for faceoff …
Game: Penguins (31-15-8) vs. Ottawa Senators (21-22-9), 7:38 p.m., Canadian Tire Centre, Ottawa
Goaltenders: Thomas Greiss (5-3-3, 2.80) vs. Robin Lehner (8-11-2, 2.94)
TV, radio: Root Sports, 105.9 the X
Online: GameCenter / Multimedia / Official game notes
February 12, 2015
Podcast: All pucks on Penguins 24/7 w/ Metzer
BY DEJAN KOVACEVIC
Here’s the podcast of my first weekly appearance on Penguins Radio 24/7, the team’s online HD station, with host Brian Metzer. It’s all pucks, obviously. Looking forward to this all year round.
February 12, 2015
Column: Penguins find healthy perspective
Blake Comeau is congratulated on his first-period goal by Evgeni Malkin and Simon Despres. — GETTY
BY DEJAN KOVACEVIC
None of this has been all that complex.
In fact, if surveying the Penguins’ problems spanning this starcrossed 2014-15 season, it can pretty much be condensed to these 15 words, spoken by Patric Hornqvist late Wednesday after that 4-1 rout of the Red Wings at Consol Energy Center: “We’ve got one hell of a hockey team.”
Wait for the other seven words. They followed a brief pause.
“When we’ve actually got our hockey team.”
Oh, yeah. The guy doesn’t just take a straight line to the net, you know.
February 11, 2015
On location: Penguins 4, Red Wings 1
BY DEJAN KOVACEVIC
Getting ready for faceoff …
Game: Penguins (30-15-8) vs. Detroit Red Wings (31-12-9), 8:10 p.m., Consol Energy Center
Goaltenders: Marc-Andre Fleury (25-11-5, 2.25) vs. Petr Mrazek (12-4-1, 2.50)
TV, radio: NBC Sports (national), 105.9 the X
Online: GameCenter / Multimedia / Official game notes
UPDATE 7:32 p.m.: The Penguins will play Blake Comeau and Beau Bennett tonight. The scratches are Zach Sill and Christian Ehrhoff. The top two lines are what you’d expect, with Comeau back on the No. 2. Brandon Sutter will center Bennett and Nick Spaling. Maxim Lapierre will center Steve Downie and Craig Adams.
February 11, 2015
Podcast: All Penguins w/ Madden
BY DEJAN KOVACEVIC
Here’s the podcast of my weekly visit on 105.9 the X with Mark Madden, this one at the Blue Line Grille across from Consol. Not surprisingly, we went all pucks.
February 11, 2015
Morning Java: Home improvement
BY DEJAN KOVACEVIC
From someone who gets stuck watching way too much HGTV as background noise, here are three wholly unsolicited home improvement suggestions for our big-league sports facilities.
February 10, 2015
Tuesday 12 Qs: Borts, Big Mac, Brandon, baseball
Robert Bortuzzo and the Canucks’ Zack Kassian fight Saturday in Vancouver. — GETTY
BY DEJAN KOVACEVIC
Welcome to Tuesday 12 Qs, our chat that takes place each week at 9 a.m. and offers you a chance to carry the conversation. (Which undoubtedly is a great idea given how sensationally I’m recovering from seven flights in six days!)
Use the comments below to submit an entry. No more than one per person, please. Submit early if you prefer, and I’ll pick from that batch to get rolling, then monitor new entries once we go live.
UPDATE 9 a.m.: And away we go …
turk482: Everyone seems focused on a top-six winger, but watching the Pens in some recent struggles, it seems that they miss the physical presence of a Brooks Orpik-like defenseman more than another winger. Neither Robert Bortuzzo, Scott Harrington or Rob Scuderi seem to fill that need. Should this be their trade deadline focus?
DK: It is, actually, as I reported from Western Canada. And yes, it absolutely should be.
February 8, 2015
Column: Packing up Penguins’ pluses, minuses
Steve Downie can’t get the puck past the Canucks’ Ryan Miller Saturday night in Vancouver. — GETTY
BY DEJAN KOVACEVIC
VANCOUVER, British Columbia — “Ugh,” Brandon Sutter was saying, or something that sounded suspiciously like that. “Nothing there. Just nothing. Maybe the first 10 minutes.”
Yeah, maybe not even that.
And it wasn’t anywhere near that close.
The visitors looked fatigued, frustrated and — let’s face it — they played lousy on top of all that. It made for one seriously flat finish to a Western Canada trip that opened Wednesday with a take-care-of-business shutout of the awful Oilers and peaked Friday with a full-throttle shutout of the contending Flames.
