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Tuesday, 09 November 2010 06:58

Written by Seth Rorabaugh

There are a myriad of theories as to why the Penguins' power play hasn't enjoyed greater success.

One which has caught our eye involves Chris Kunitz (above, with Detroit's Chris Osgood in the preseason). It's been popular to suggest he is simply not an adequate net-front presence.

We won't debate the validity of that arguement. We'll just examine some data.

When you look at the numbers involving the Penguins' meager success with the man advantage this season, no other player has been on the ice for more of the team's 10 power play goals.

Here's a breakdown of the Penguins' players and how many power play goals they have been on the ice for:

What does this all mean? No idea. But it seems to us that whatever problems exist with the power play, they're much bigger than Chris Kunitz.

(Photo: Claus Andersen/Getty Images)

Comments (11)

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written by Dravid, November 09, 2010 - 07:44 AM

Nice stats. That being said, I think we also need to consider how much ice time these guys have had on the powerplay. Of course if they (Kunitz, Crosby, Gogo, Malkin, and Letang) average more ice time than anyone else on the team chances are higher that they'll be on for more PP goals. Of course, Malkin and Crosby should be on for the majority of powerplay minutes, but I digress. I wonder though; Rupp has been on for two powerplay goals, but I bet Kunitz is getting over 4.5 times more powerplay minutes than Rupper. That would make Rupp more effective...on paper anyways.

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written by eman41, November 09, 2010 - 09:19 AM

Gogo really needs to start shooting the puck and stop passing to Malkin. Bylsma should just fine charge $100 per pass to Malkin or Crosby while on the power play. It would pay for a lot of Qdoba!

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written by espo33, November 09, 2010 - 09:57 AM

I have said it for the last 2+ years, split up Malkin and Crosby on the PP units. they both try to do the same thing. Split them up.

Crosby-Kunitz-Kennedy
Gols-Letang

Malkin-Letestu-Rupp
Martin-Gols/Letang

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written by Wintermute, November 09, 2010 - 10:13 AM

espo33, your ideas are intriguing to me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter. I think Malkin in particular needs to feel like The Man on the power play and be selfish. He doesn't do that when Crosby is our there. Maybe even throw Comrie out with him to see if they can recreate the chemistry they had in the preseason with extra ice to work with.

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written by Bones, November 09, 2010 - 10:30 AM

Agree 100 percent that Malkin and Crosby should be split up, the "all the eggs in one basket" approach is not working. Both of them are competitive guys with a lot of pride and maybe a sense of "whatever you can do I can do better" would motivate both to get their respective powerplays running.

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written by eman41, November 09, 2010 - 11:20 AM

People are only saying "split up Crosby and Malkin" because it's literally the only thing left that they haven't tried. I don't think it would do anything positive.

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written by Disgruntled Goat, November 09, 2010 - 01:37 PM

espo---Are you seriously suggesting that they demote Malkin from the top PP unit in favor of Tyler 'Anyone who thinks I stink doesn't know anything about hockey' Kennedy? I don't understand how putting less talent on the ice would help. But, as eman said, its the only thing that they haven't tried...other than shooting the puck or getting a top six winger.

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written by krikker, November 09, 2010 - 08:21 PM

Seth,
I have to agree with Dravidian. The stats are nice but absent the minutes played a bit difficult to read too much into. Before splitting up geno and Sid, I would work on figuring out how to get into the zone. We lose a tremendous amount of puck possession time with our haphazard entries.

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written by Student, November 09, 2010 - 09:49 PM

Kris Letang hasn't scored a power-play goal since the 2008-2009 season, when he scored four. This covers about 90 games. A fine player, but with the Penguin power play the whole doesn't always equal the sum of the parts. Could his often errant shot be contributing to the problem?

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written by danch70, November 09, 2010 - 10:23 PM

I may not have watched them enough, but the problem seems schematic to me. They can pass the puck around seven times in a row and still never have a better scoring chance than just cranking it on net. When I watch, the players without the puck seem to turn into pylons and just stand around. There doesn't seem to be more of a plan than just everyone stand in their one spot. It is very stale. The Red Wings of a few years back, meanwhile, would be in constant motion the entire power play and it would only take a few passes to give a player an open look.

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written by Dravid, November 10, 2010 - 03:41 AM

Here's another obvious point; Gogo and Letang can't seem to get the puck through traffic to the net. Gonchar had the ability to get the puck through regardless of the bodies in front. Notice also that most of his goals (Gonchar's) were from the center position between the points near the blue line. That would give him a better angle to the net and still leave him with the option to pass the puck to the half boards.

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