Pierre McGuire has one way the Penguins can avoid another early playoff exit: getting more physical.
In an interview Monday with the PM Team, the longtime NHL analyst was asked to compare and contrast the Penguins with the Islanders, who are in the Eastern Conference Finals. McGuire said Pittsburgh needs to play a more punishing style of hockey on the defensive end.
"I think they've got to be harder on the four-check physically," he said. "That's something that could help the Penguins a lot. I think if they could ever find a player who that could play a bit like Ryan Pulock. That's not a knock on Kristopher (Letang) or Brian Dumoulin, but Pulock is a unique hybrid type of player. He scored a huge goal yesterday, obviously. His shot is massive. He's so stealth defensively. He doesn't get caught out of position very often, and he can muscle up on guys. He can really hurt you with some big hits."
Of course, that's easier said than done, since Pulock was a first-round pick. Still, it's clear the Penguins need to improve on the blue line. The Islanders beat them up during their series, and went on to punish the Bruins, a superior club on paper.
"They had that shutdown tandem of Adam Pelech and Ryan Pulock," McGuire said. "That twosome did a number of the Bruins five-on-five in the last three games against Boston. Pulock can do it defensively, offensively and he can hurt people physically. He's not dirty. He's a clean player. They're hard guys to find, obviously. But that would be something I would be looking for. I think the biggest thing for the Penguins is if they could just get a little more physically like the Islanders do. That would help a lot."
After failing to advance past the second round for four straight years, the pressure is on the Penguins to make another Cup run with Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin. If only they still had Marc-Andre Fleury in net, right?
"I don't want to rub it in, because that's really unfair of anybody to do that," McGuire said. "Pittsburgh decided a while go that Marc-Andre wasn't going to be their goalie of the future. He's been (in Las Vegas) for four years. He's the face of the franchise."
