Kevin Gorman: Penguins shouldn't panic, but they need to show some urgency

UNIONDALE, N.Y. – The Pittsburgh Penguins say they aren’t about to press the panic button, even after they blew a lead against the New York Islanders and a critical chance to even their Stanley Cup playoffs first-round series.

Maybe they already did.

Not only did the Penguins make a lineup change, but they spent much of the first two periods killing penalties and allowed the Islanders to steal momentum in the third period for a 3-1 victory in Game 2 Friday night at Nassau Coliseum.

Where Tampa Bay coach Jon Cooper called the Lightning losing their first two games to Columbus a “five-alarm fire,” Mike Sullivan sounded more like a two-time Cup champion coach than someone who is welcoming adversity.

Then again, the Lightning lost two at home. The Penguins lost two on the road, so they know this is far from over.

“The message, as I said to the players after the game, ‘It’s the first team to win four games, not two,’ ” Sullivan said. “We’ve got to go back home. We’ve got to control what we can, and we’ve got to win one game. And we’ll go from there.”

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The Penguins are in a predicament, and not just because they didn’t win a game at Nassau Coliseum. They are in a funk, one that isn’t simple to solve. They aren’t playing the brand of hockey that led to back-to-back Cup championships in 2016-17. They aren’t playing, as Sullivan likes to say, the right way.

The Penguins talk about focusing on their game, but their strategy has been to counter the Islanders by pushing the puck past the forecheck, even taking icing calls to keep it out of their own end. That strategy has led to second-guessing from a star.

“We see mistakes, what we did wrong,” Penguins center Evgeni Malkin said. “I think it’s huge, like when in the neutral zone we lose the puck. … We know they have five guys on the forecheck and try to stop our passes. Maybe from the blue line, we should shoot to the net.”

But there are signs the Penguins are doing so because they don’t trust their blue liners. That started with Sullivan’s decision to scratch Jack Johnson for Game 1, only to reinsert Johnson in place of Olli Maatta for Game 2.

GAME 2 POSTGAME POLL: We'll keep this simple. How's this gonna go after the #Isles took the first two from the #Pens?

— Tribune-ReviewSports (@TribSports) April 13, 2019

Johnson made that call look questionable in the first period when he was called for high-sticking at 13:38. Only nine seconds after bounding out of the penalty box, Johnson collided with a pair of Islanders defensemen, first Johnny Boychuk and then sending Adam Pelech spinning to the ice.

Both Malkin and Johnson spent two stints in the penalty box in the first period. That the Penguins were called for eight penalties compounded their problems, forcing their penalty-kill to stay on the ice while keeping their star scorers on the bench.

“Ideally, we wouldn’t have to kill as many penalties but I still thought we generated some decent chances,” Crosby said. “I think it’s coming down to execution. They’re getting the big play and big goals. When the game is tied, you’ve got to find a way to get the next one. Unfortunately, we didn’t do that.”

The Penguins, on the other hand, aren’t getting big play or big goals from their best players. Instead, they are getting costly mistakes. Defenseman Kris Letang’s turnover in overtime led to the Islanders’ Game 1 winner, and Malkin’s mishap in the neutral led to the go-ahead goal by Jordan Eberle in the third period of Game 2. Both were inexcusable.

The good news is, the Penguins aren’t making excuses.

But they need to show some urgency. The Penguins have overcome 2-0 deficits in the playoffs before. That explains their calm reaction compared to the Lightning’s alarms.

Crosby, Malkin and Letang remember losing the first two games to both the Washington Capitals in the second round and the Detroit Red Wings in the Final before winning both series in seven games on their way to the 2009 Cup championship.

“It’s fine,” Malkin said. “It’s not positive right now after a loss but we have a great team. I believe in this group. I believe we can change, take one game and see what we can do in the next.”

But that was a decade ago.

This is a reminder the Penguins have since lost the two series in which they lost the first two games, to the Philadelphia Flyers in six games in 2012 and getting swept by the Boston Bruins in ’13. And the Penguins haven’t exactly been world beaters on their home ice, especially this season.

“Your urgency becomes higher. That should bring out the best in us,” Crosby said. “We’ve been these situations this year and it’s brought out the best in our team. If we come with the right mentality and execute a little bit better, we’ll get the result we want.”

If it doesn’t bring out the best in the Penguins, they will get the result no one expected: A quick exit from the playoffs and a long summer to think about what went wrong.

Keep up with the Pittsburgh Penguins all season long.