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The Confluence

Shero’s signings make Penguins “tough” team to play

by Tony on 12/01/09 at 11:21 AM ET
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There was a time, not very long ago at all, that opponents could face the Pittsburgh Penguins and be relatively confident that they’d come out of it fairly healthy.

Oh sure, the Penguins have always had their resident enforcer, whether that’s recently been Eric Cairns, Andre Roy, Georges Laraque or presently Eric Godard.

But Penguins’ GM Ray Shero has done yet another masterful job over the past couple years at signing players who can dish out physical play just as much, if not more, as those who attempt to play the body against the Penguins and their world-class centers.

Shero has now gotten the Penguins roster to this type of balance:  Wanna have a track meet ??  No problem (although why would you ?).  Wanna ramp up the physical play.  That’s now not a problem, either.

While it’s still relatively early in the season, the Penguins, possibly surprising to many, have four players in the top 17 in the NHL in hits.  Brooks Oprik is 7th with 82, Matt Cooke is tied for 13th with 77, Craig Adams is 16th with 76 and Mike Rupp is 17th with 73.

Now, let me get this out of the way.  Yes, I’m aware of how judgmental and subjective the awarding of hits is in today’s NHL, similar to the awarding of other stats.  Some arena’s officials are extremely conservative, while some award stats much more liberally.  I get that.

But the point is that in the first couple years of the careers of Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin, while they’ve always had the ability to send out their enforcer for the arranged fight when it was necessary, they haven’t always had more than one or two players that could play a physical game on a regular basis.  Orpik is the exception, of course, and while he was here, Ryan Malone was near the top of the Penguins team in hits as well.

In addition, the Penguins haven’t always had the right types of bodies to turn the tables and play physical against the opponent’s top players.  That now has changed as well.  Last night’s victory over the Rangers was a pretty clear example.  Marian Gaborik was left relatively alone in front of the Penguins’ net twice in the first two periods, and it cost them two goals.  The Pens’ strategy was clear for the third period, and that was to get much more physical with Gaborik, and for the most past, it worked.  Orpik had several plays where he hit Gaborik along the boards in the third period.  Gaborik still got some shots off, being the sniper he is, but he wasn’t as wide open as he was earlier.

It’s a nice balance to have, obviously.  Being able to throw out three outstanding scoring lines, as well as being able to play a physical game when required, gives GMRS and HCDB a lot of options when it comes to setting a lineup.

Filed in: | The Confluence | Permalink
 Tags: NHL-Hockey, Pittsburgh+Penguins,

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