Lack of shots a weak ploy for Penguins

Thursday, February 24, 2011
By Gene Collier, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
http://www.post-gazette.com/sports/

Matt Freed/Post-Gazette

Sharks forward Patrick Marleau scores in overtime on Penguins goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury and defenseman Zbynek Michalek during Wednesday's game at Consol Energy Center

Most of the shots the Penguins managed Wednesday night would not have beaten your Auntie Niemmy, much less San Jose's superb goalkeeper, Antti Niemi.

But the one Kris Letang fired during a third-period power play could have and probably should have found the net, except that Niemi's glove seemed to have a mind of its own as Letang's unimpeded wrister from the right faceoff circle whistled right into it.

That was the only shot of the power play and only the 21st of a long and mostly listless game, at least until Tyler Kennedy realized it was garbage night. Kennedy's second goal, a virtual replay of his first, tied the score with 50 seconds remaining, forcing an overtime that merely extended the Penguins' offensive misery.

There's no shame in losing, 3-2, in overtime. The shame is in that three goals in one game seem a virtual impossibility around here.

The Penguins began their cameo in Shark Week with a curious solution to the growing problem of offensive ineptitude.

After 39 shots failed to find the net Monday night against Washington, Dan Bylsma's team got set for the feeding frenzy that is the San Jose Sharks (14 wins in their past 17 games) by apparently resolving to simply forget about shooting altogether.

I mean shooting wasn't working, so let's try not shooting.

So for the first 4:18 Wednesday night, the Penguins did just that, or until Pascal Dupuis could no longer help himself. They shot all of six times on goal in the first period, including the one that got slapped in by Kennedy, who saw the puck sitting on the doorstep with no one around.

Kennedy's 13th of the season made it 1-0, but it didn't create so much as the illusion that the Penguins "attack" had benefited much immediately from the addition of James Neal, a big left winger Ray Shero finagled from Dallas this week to jump-start goal production.

"It's a little nerve-racking," said Dupuis of Neal's transition to a new club, himself having arrived in a late February trade just three winters ago. "It's not like you have to prove yourself, but you want to make a good impression. He's a big-bodied guy who can shoot the puck from the half-wall."

It was Dupuis who would set up Neal for his first official shot as a Penguins player, leaving him a nifty drop pass between the circles in one of the few scoring chances the Penguins generated in the third period. Neal had his first couple of shots blocked, but on this third-period opportunity, he tried to send the puck over Niemi's left shoulder, finding his glove instead.

In the absence of offense that has pretty much been a Penguins staple since Feb. 1, the previous time they scored four goals in a game, reliance again magnetized to the defense in general and the league's best penalty-killers in particular. The two penalties they killed in the first period where the 250th and 251st of the season, but 252 proved elusive when Logan Couture rammed Devin Setoguchi's perfect pass from the back wall past Marc-Andre Fleury to tie the score early in the second period. No one should have been caught off guard by the site of Couture pumping in a big goal. His eight game-winning goals lead the Sharks.

And for the second consecutive home game, the second period was delayed as the sellout crowd again waited for the house lights to come back to full power. More evidence, clearly, that the Penguins need a new building.

Maybe one named for an energy company, or something.

The Penguins power play didn't power up any more quickly in its only attempt through two periods. With Joe Thornton off for hooking Jordan Staal, only Kennedy and Matt Cooke managed to put pucks on Niemi, with neither a great challenge. That left the power play one for its past 13 and two for its previous 19. Kennedy and Cooke had the period's best scoring chance about four minutes early, breaking in two on one, but San Jose defenseman Ian White foiled their plans, assuming they had any.

The most critical shifts again came late in the period, again by the penalty-killers, who operated without Brooks Orpik when the big defenseman apparently hurt himself killing the second penalty. But when they killed Matt Niskanen's tripping minor in the final minutes of the second, it saved them from entering the third period behind, an unfavorable climate in which the Penguins are 0-15-1.

Neal will have his impact soon. He pretty much has to.

Gene Collier: gcollier@post-gazette.com.

Related:

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/11055/1127630-61.stm