The Pittsburgh Penguins have mostly gotten through their tough stretch of the season and now have an opportunity to win some more games.
Given the way the first quarter of the 2024-25 season went for the Pittsburgh Penguins this is not a sentence that I expected to be typing in early December.
But they have a chance to make this season interesting for at least a little bit longer.
They have a chance to maybe play their way back into the playoff race. At least for now.
They enter the week having won five of their past six games, and along with the results have mostly had a strong process behind them. The one loss, the game against the New York Rangers on Friday night, was a pretty disappointing performance given the issues with the Rangers, but they bounced back on Saturday and played one of their most complete games of the season against a really good Toronto Maple Leafs team.
This past stretch of games was supposed to be where things were going to get ugly. A who’s who list of top teams and contenders all lined up one after another. They not only mostly navigated it, they handled it about as well as could have been expected.
Are there still big flaws and concerns? You better believe there are
But along with getting better results the process behind those results has at least been improved. It is something.
Now they should have a chance to build on that a little bit this week and throughout the rest of December.
The week starts on Tuesday with a home game against the Colorado Avalanche. While that might look like a tough matchup on paper — and as long as Nathan MacKinnon, Mikko Rantanen and Cale Makar are on the ice, it will be — but that game is suddenly looking a lot more winnable than it maybe would have at the start of the season.
Not necessarily because of anything the Penguins are doing, but because Colorado has its own share of issues right now.
Injuries are certainly one of them.
But perhaps even more important is the fact Colorado is one of the few teams in the NHL that might actually have a worse goaltending situation than the Penguins right now, and it is absolutely ruining their season.
As a team Colorado ranks 31st in 5-on-5 save percentage and 32nd in all situations save percentage.
Alexandar Georgiev and Justus Annunen have been so bad that the latter was traded this past week for Scott Wedgewood in the hopes he might be able to at least give them somewhat passable goaltending. I don’t know if that is the answer. That situation is also what makes this a potentially winnable game for the Penguins. And if they can steal two points there, the rest of December is set up for them to maybe make some noise and make a move in the standings.
It starts later this week with road games at the Montreal Canadiens and Ottawa Senators.
They play in Montreal on Thursday night.
The challenge with the Canadiens is going to be stopping their top-line scorers. Cole Caufield and Nick Suzuki have been huge bright spots there this season, and the return of Patrik Laine has definitely given the offense — and the team — a little bit of a spark. That trio can hurt you and change a game.
But the rest of the roster is just .... not particularly good. They are one of the youngest teams in the league and also one of the worst teams in the league. Especially defensively. They are giving up over three expected goals per 60 minutes of 5-on-5 play, ranking them 31st in the league.
Starting goalie Sam Montembeault has actually held his own given that play in front of him, but this is a team that can be had defensively. This is a chance for the Penguins to score some goals.
On Saturday they play a Senators team that is still stuck in neutral in its rebuild.
The addition of Linus Ullmark as their new No. 1 goalie was supposed to help change things, but it has not.
Largely due to his own play.
He enters this week with a sub-.900 save percentage, while goaltending has again been a team-wide issue for the Senators.
From a numbers perspective, Ottawa’s defensive play has not actually been all that bad. They are a top-10 teams in terms of suppressing total shot attempts, shots on goal, high-danger scoring chances and expected goals.
They are simply not getting many saves.
They also have some really good high-end talent at the top of the lineup — specifically Tim Stutzle and Brady Tkachuk — but the rest of the offense and the team has simply been incredibly underwhelming. It is another winnable game.
Even with the Penguins’ issues this season, this still seems like a week where at least four points at a minimum should be the expectation. These are all games that are, to some degree, winnable. They should win at least two of them. I honestly do not care which two. Just win two of them and really set the stage for the rest of December. This might not be a playoff team or a contending team, but watching somewhat competitive hockey for a little bit longer will be definitely interesting.
