Listen.
It's a word Penguins coach Mike Sullivan uses quite often when he wants to make a point to those of us in the media and, by extension, to you.
Reporter – "Mike, why did _______ do (something stupid)?"
Sully – "Listen . . ." and then go on to explain that he and his assistants don't tell their players to do stupid things or play poorly; sometimes stuff just happens.
Reporter – "Mike why did (something bad happen)?
Sully – "Listen . . ." and then go on to explain that there are a lot of good players/teams in the league; so sometimes you just have to give the other guys credit.
And we do listen because, typically, Sullivan is thoughtful, respectful (even of more frivolous questions) and his answers make sense. He didn't coach two Stanley Cup winners by accident.
Yet, why is that the people who don't seem to be listening are his players?
I can guarantee that Sullivan and assistant Todd Rierden don't tell their players to pass the puck around the perimeter on the power play and wait for the perfect tap-in. They encourage them to shoot the puck to create rebounds, chaos among opposing defenders and scoring chances.
You know, something like this:
Maybe it's a Washington thing because just when it looked like the Penguins had finally adopted a shot-first mentality, they reverted to refusing to shoot against the Islanders. A similar thing happens on the penalty kill.
Now, while I admit that I cannot guarantee assistant Mike Vellucci is telling his penalty killers to be passive and play a soft box against opposing power plays, I can't imagine Sullivan would endorse that. In fact, the Pens PK manages to at least somewhat control Washington's power play while making the Islanders look like Detroit's Russian 5 from the 90s.
After watching his team fail to generate a single shot on goal over the first 16 minutes Sunday evening on Long Island on their way to a well-deserved 2-0 defeat (actually the skaters deserved to lose 6 or 7-0 but for the work of Casey DeSmith), Sullivan had reached his wits end.
I have either covered or heard all of his post-game news conferences and I can't remember Sullivan being that mad after a game, not even after getting swept by the Islanders in 2019 or collapsing in the Toronto bubble last summer.
The normally thoughtful, analytical Sullivan had turned into Angry Sully, replying with a one-second answer in one instance and a one word answer In another. It was clear he was biting his tongue
Conventional wisdom is that if Sullivan was like that with the media during his post-game zoom – which ran under two minutes – that he must have really laid into his players. But I would bet that if he did at all, Sullivan kept if brief. It wouldn't have taken long to get his point across and the players know how badly they played.
Monday was a scheduled day off so the Penguins players didn't work on the power play, they didn't work on the penalty kill and they didn't even have to listen to their coaches – not that they would have, anyway.
Perhaps some of us are simply over-reacting to what is still a limited sample size and this is a situation where the Penguins don't match up well with the Islanders but do match up against the slower Capitals, even though the Caps now lead the division.
However, there is no over-reacting to what's ahead and that's three straight games against the Flyers, starting Tuesday. You may remember the Flyers not only drubbed the Penguins in the first two games of the season but they made the Pens look slow.
It should help that all three games are at PPG Paints Arena; should help.
Of course, should is not even close to a sure thing so let's over-react a little bit. Listen, the Penguins season could be on the line these next three games.
