Pittsburgh Sports

Winless Pens look frustrated

By The Hack
An early season record of 0-2-4 have the Penguins frustrated with their performance and inability to finish off checks, play team defense and generally look like the highly skilled team they were advertised to be in the preseason.

Most coaches will tell you that in a long season like the NHL has, these streakes will occur. But the Pens need to correct some basic flaws in the system. It seems in the early going that they have been beaten to the corners and in open ice to lose pucks. This is lack of grit and hustle.When a team looks like it has more men on the ice than yours, it usually means they are outplaying you.

They need to stop looking for the long bomb pass and shorten up the seperation between players. These length of the ice passes have been either picked off or knocked harmlessly to side boards.Forwards need to comeback and assist the defensemen. Play defense with footspeed not grab and hold techniques used in the past.. Our defense has three offensive players in Jackman,Tarnstrom and Gonchar and all have looked on haplessly when the puck is in front of our net. The goalies have been better than average but are going to need more help from the defense and offensive minded forwards.

The Pens have only scored the first goal in one of the first six games. That is unacceptable. It is not as crucial to score the opening goal in todays NHL as it was in the past but at this point the players may begin to get that "here we go again" feeling.

A glairing weakness that was never addressed in the preseason was the need for a faceoff man. It has been prevailant in first week. Lemieux has done a good job but Rookie Sidney Crosby has been forced to battle veteran faceoff men and just isn't ready for that responibility yet. This disadvantage has led to goals for opposition and a solution doesn't look to be obvious for the team. Maybe vets Recchi ,LeClair or Fata will be called into the circle for the draw.

Eddie Olczyk and his staff must be wondering what to do next because they have adjusted the lines already and are waiting to see some guys gel as a unit. Organizations will not panic like the fans and are probably looking at this slow start as an adjustment period by the players to their new linemates and all the new rules implemented after the lockout was settled. Most teams take the long season and break it up into 10 or 20 game increments. This could just be a bad section of the year that will be a distant memory once the team takes off.

WEEK PREVIEW

The week of October 16th through 22nd shows only two games and gives the team some time to practice and work out all the problems that have them winless. Thursday the 20th has them playing the NJ Devils for the 2nd time this year. Expect to see the Pens hustling in this rematch. The 5-1 loss is still fresh in their heads and will be easy to draw on in this one.

Saturday they travel to Boston and play the Bruins for another rematch. Although Boston has been without Joe Thornton and Alex Zhamnov, the young Patrice Bergeron has stepped up and sparked the offense. D-holdout Nick Boynton has signed and Goalie Andrew Raycroft will be tough to beat in net.