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Penguins too eager for their own good down the stretch |
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And just like that the 2024-25 season is over for the Pittsburgh Penguins. After a 5-2 victory over the Washington Capitals they will finish 34-36-12 and have dropped all the way down to the ninth spot in the NHL draft.
If you are looking at things from a pragmatic approach, falling that far down when they never had any chance to make the playoffs is a disappointment. It did nothing for the present and lowered the odds of doing something for the future. The empty calorie wins will not be remembered fondly. None of us play on the actual team so I can’t relate with people who just had to see these wins, just because. There is no blame to be placed on the players. They have one job to do and they go out and try to do it. I think Kyle Dubas should have acted more like Rachel Phelps from Major League and put them in a position to lose more. The team took standings points in eight out of their last ten games.
People can say it is a weak draft and what is the difference between a few slots, but if I were running a team trying to rebuild/retool I would at least attempt to maximize the probability of landing players who will eventually help you. While it isn’t likely, the Penguins can drop to the 11th slot depending on the lottery outcome.
That brings us to our next variable. The team currently in that 11th slot is the New York Rangers. They have a big choice to make. Give the Penguins that 11th overall pick and save their first round pick for the McKenna draft or they could keep the 11th overall pick and give Pittsburgh next year’s. They had a pretty rough season. I would argue a worse season than Pittsburgh, because with the Penguins you knew they weren’t a legit team. The Rangers were trying to win it all and only found themselves two spots in the standings removed from Pittsburgh.
They are a complete mess with Artemi Panarin being accused of sexual assault and MSG paying off an employee, and players like Mika Zibanejad and Chris Kreider potentially playing their final game for the team. They are very dependent on Igor Shesterkin and when he’s a .905 goalie making 11.5M starting next year that’s gonna be problem. Alexis Lafreniere will be a 7.45M player starting in 2025-26, he had 45 points playing in all 82 games this past season.
The Rangers are between a rock and a hard place with their decision.
I’ll close with some positives about some of the Penguins players, because once again, it isn’t their fault for trying to win.
First, Sidney Crosby has done it again. He was able to crack the 90 point barrier for the third consecutive season. Those seasons were his age 35, 36, and 37 seasons. This isn’t normal by any stretch, it just feels that way because Sidney Crosby has a way of normalizing this kind of success. Per the NHL, no player in NHL history has recorded 90 points in three seasons at age 35 or older. Now someone has. I wouldn’t put it by Sid to make it four years in a row.
I want to take a moment to give Bryan Rust his flowers. He was able to score two goals last night and by doing so got himself his first ever 30 goal season. This was someone who arrived in Pittsburgh with very little fanfare and just continued to grind and work hard day after day year after year. He has gotten better with each NHL season and this milestone is very much deserved. I’ve had the opportunity on a handful of occasions to see the team practice and I was always drawn to his work ethic and how he would always find time to work with coaches on specific skills to try and get marginally better. He’s been a wonderful player for the team.
Ville Koivunen will be a top six player for the Penguins. He finished with seven points in his eight games played. He has th vision, patience, and awareness to be very dangerous. He has the physical tools to put those instincts to work.
Rickard Rakell had a career year after a tough injury riddled year in 2023-24. He finished with 35 goals and 70 points while bumping his shooting percentage from 9.1 to 17.2%. I think there is still potential for him to be traded in the offseason, but I believe it is likelier he will open the season with the Penguins next year.
Lastly, with the season ending against the Capitals both Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin wanted to honor Alexander Ovechkin’s amazing accomplishment by becoming the NHL’s all-time leading goal scorer.
And with that we move on to locker room clean out day.
Thanks for reading!
Pittsburgh Penguins Blogger • 
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