PITTSBURGH — It’s early, and more formidable opponents will prove a tougher test. Still, coach Mike Sullivan’s decision to turn Evgeni Malkin into one of Sidney Crosby’s wingers might have saved the Pittsburgh Penguins’ season.
Hyperbolic? Maybe not.
Crosby scored twice Saturday night in the Penguins’ 3-1 victory over the Montreal Canadiens at PPG Paints Arena. He has scored two goals in consecutive games, each Penguins victories, and has totaled 7 points in three games since Malkin became his full-time winger on the top line.
Tonight marks just the seventh time Sidney Crosby has scored multiple goals in back-to-back games 🚨 pic.twitter.com/YdmM5c2vJ9
— Penguins PR (@PenguinsPR) November 3, 2024
Malkin hasn’t recorded a point in those games, though his mini-slump is no indication of a decline in play. Rather, there’s only one puck to go around, and Malkin is using his skating — improved from recent seasons — to open space for Crosby and their line’s other winger, Rickard Rakell.
“The more we play together, the more familiar we get,” Crosby said of playing with Malkin. “He’s somebody that can hold on to the puck, and he likes to carry it, so it’s just a matter of trying to read off him and get open or create space when he does have it.”
Crosby has simplified his never-flashy game to ease the transition of having Malkin on his flank. He has gone to the net with increased frequency. He has darted into scoring areas to drag defensemen and backtracking forwards away from Malkin. He has occasionally allowed Malkin to work as the center by assuming winger responsibilities mid-shift.
That last one is the old “switch-off,” and Crosby conceded Saturday its goal is to “keep teams on their toes, hopefully.”
Sullivan isn’t the first coach to put Crosby and Malkin together.
Michel Therrien, Dan Bylsma and Mike Johnston did it too. Until this week, Sullivan was aligned with his predecessors in Pittsburgh, seemingly believing the Penguins’ “two-headed monster” playing together was a break-glass-in-emergency ploy.
The emergency arrived sooner than anybody with the Penguins would have predicted.
They were on a 0-4-1 slide before Sullivan attempted the hockey coach’s equivalent of a Hail Mary pass. They were last in the Metropolitan Division and ahead of only the San Jose Sharks in the overall standings.
The Penguins were in such a precarious spot despite Malkin racking up 14 points in 11 games, a late-career renaissance that should have had the Penguins in a much better spot than 3-6-1.
Crosby had scored only a goal to go with six assists, and he was a minus-7.
His struggles embodied those of the Penguins. The latter couldn’t dig itself out of a significant early-season hole if the former didn’t somehow start looking more like his usual self.
And the bare minimum from Crosby in every season has been scoring at a point-per-game pace.
He’s back on that pace since Malkin’s move to winger.
There was a sense within the organization that its fortunes were about to change after a woeful Canadian trip. The Penguins had gone 0-3-1, but Crosby felt as though a trip-closing loss to the Vancouver Canucks last Saturday offered signs of hope.
“We did a lot of good things, had a bad five minutes,” Crosby said of that defeat. “It’s not something that happens overnight, but I thought we were trending the right way except for some lapses there.”
Crosby agreed the Penguins were “better” in a loss to the Minnesota Wild on Tuesday night. The emotions of that game, which marked former franchise goalie Marc-André Fleury’s final start in Pittsburgh, not to mention the result, overshadowed the Penguins arguably deserving a better fate.
Sullivan is fond of the adage that a team is never as bad as it looks at the end of a losing streak or as good as it does at the end of a winning streak.
Well, two in a row doesn’t qualify as a winning streak. With victories over the Anaheim Ducks and Canadiens since that loss to the Wild, all the Penguins did was stop the bleeding from the wound their first 11 games opened.
Sullivan said after the Wild loss that scoring their way out of the fog was not an option for the Penguins. They have been decent defensively over the last couple of wins, at least above the low bar set in October.
Nothing will mean more to the Penguins from now until when — if ever — they return to the mix of viable postseason contenders than their being at least somewhat responsible defensively.
It’s not exactly in their DNA, but it’s the only way they’ll turn the past few days into the kind of run that makes up for the damage done by those first 11 games.
“It’s something that you’ve got to continue to work at,” Crosby said. “It’s not easy to play that way. It takes a lot of discipline and effort.
“To bring that every night is important. To do it, to see it get results, is huge.”
Another week away from home awaits, beginning with a visit to the New York Islanders on Tuesday.
The Islanders, also compromised by a poor start to the season, are the Penguins’ final weaker opponent before road games at the Carolina Hurricanes and Washington Capitals and returning home to play the Dallas Stars.
The Penguins are 1-7-1 against teams with at or above a .500 points percentage. Four of their victories have come against opponents likely to participate in the NHL Draft lottery.
To avoid joining them in that lottery, the Penguins probably need Crosby to maintain his rediscovered offensive prowess — and for Malkin to get back to his form coming into this past week.
Even that might not be enough.
Things are looking better for the Penguins. Better doesn’t mean good, though.
(Top photo: Joe Sargent / NHLI via Getty Images)
