Who: Pittsburgh Penguins
(38-21-16, 92 points, 2nd place Metropolitan Division) @ Tampa Bay Lightning (46-22-6, 98 points, 2nd place Atlantic Division)When: 7:00 p.m. eastern
How to Watch: Locally broadcast on Sportsnet Pittsburgh and The Spot, streaming on ESPN+
Pens’ Path Ahead: The March of the Penguins concludes literally (though perhaps not figuratively) tonight with the team wrapping up their franchise record of 17 games in a calendar month. The Pens are 7-6-3 and managed to hold on against a brutal
schedule while weathering some key absences. There’s another flurry of weekend games, the Florida Panthers play in PPG Paints both Saturday (5:00pm start) and Sunday (3:00pm start) and then Pittsburgh gets their first stretch of three days without games next Mon-Wed since early January (not counting the Olympic break). The Pens then pick back up a week from tonight on the road in New Jersey.
Opponent Track: Tampa was 6-0-2 in last eight prior to Tuesday home game against Montreal, where the Lightning lost 4-1. Tampa has a big game coming up on Saturday against the hard-charging Bruins.
Season Series: The Penguins always seem to play Tampa well, despite the difference in team strengths in the last few years. Pittsburgh is 8-4-2 overall since the 2021-22 season against the Lightning, including a 1-0-1 record this season. The Pens blew a 3-0 lead but still pulled off a regulation 4-3 win over Tampa courtesy Evgeni Malkin’s late GWG and three-point night back on December 4th. In the second meeting, Malkin scored late in the third period on January 13th to tie the game 1-1, though Tampa would go onto win in the shootout.
Hidden Stat: As referenced above, Malkin has 3G+1A in the two games against the Lightning this season. He’s got 12 goals in the other 48 non-Tampa games he’s played this season.
Getting to know the Lightning
Projected lines
FORWARDS
Jake Guentzel – Brayden Point – Nikita Kucherov
Gage Goncalves – Anthony Cirelli – Oliver Bjorkstrand
Zemgus Girgensons – Yanni Gourde – Pontus Holmberg
Corey Perry – Nic Paul
DEFENSEMEN
JJ Moser / Darren Raddysh
Ryan McDonagh / Erik Cernak
Charle-Edouard D’Astous / Emil Lilleberg
Steven Santini
Goalies: Andrei Vasilevskiy, Jonas Johansson
Potential scratches: Victor Hedman (away from team on personal leave), Brandon Hagel (injury, doubtful to play tonight),
Injured Reserve: Declan Carlile, Dominic James
- Somewhat breaking news in that Hagel picked up an injury in Tuesday night’s game against Montreal and, as of yesterday, looks like he will not be playing against the Pens. Add in Victor Hedman’s absence and Tampa suddenly is missing some key pieces.
- Hagel being out meant the Lightning concentrated a lot of their strength yesterday in practice on the top line with Guentzel-Point-Kucherov. Previously, Guentzel+Point were on one line and Kucherov was working on a different line with Hagel to split the talent. It looks like they are going to load all the way up for this game and probably count on that top line to do a lot of the heavy lifting in terms of scoring.
- Moser, who started out in Arizona for three seasons before coming over to Tampa in 2024, is probably one of the most under-rated or under-talked about great players in the league. Moser was involved in the trade that sent Mikhail Sergachev to Utah, which has worked out great for Tampa to send out an older star that they couldn’t afford and replace him with a younger, very capable option to take over.
Season stats
via hockeydb
- There are few things in the NHL more consistent than Jake Guentzel getting close to 40 goals and 80 points in a season with health (or right on pace, less the games whatever games missed with injury) over the past nine years and he’s back at it again this season. The 45 assists are already a single-season high and he’s closing in on his best year in points (84).
- Guentzel’s been hot lately, riding a current five-game point streak (5G+4A).
- Health has been a major storyline for Tampa, almost all their best players from Kucherov, Point, Hedman, McDonagh, Hagel, Cirelli, Raddysh and Paul have missed at least a handful of games at various times this season, and some more than a few. Luckily for them Vasilievskiy has been on his game and the waterfall of injuries still has their lineup seeing more than it’s share of talent.
- Kucherov has been going absolutely berserk lately with some downright Lemieux-esque production. Kuch has 39 points (11G+26A) in his last 20 games and is right in the thick of the Art Ross race. He’s four points behind leader Connor McDavid, despite the Tampa star playing seven less games.
Key Matchup: Tampa the…defensive juggernaut?
Tampa is stacked all over the board, they’re second in 5v5 goals, top-10 in Corsi, Fenwick and finishing metrics offensively. That and the star power is what they’re known for, but they’ve really buckled down defensively this season as well. Their PK is good, their goaltending is a lot better with Vasilievskiy than backup Johansson and they find ways to limit the amount of shots opponents take. Despite an anonymous defense that’s missed a bunch of their top blueliners at the same time, they’ve found ways to play keep-away with the puck and limit opportunities against.
In the first matchup back in December, the Pens got 31 shots against Tampa (and scored four goals on Johansson). In the second matchup, Pittsburgh registered 27 shots, only scoring once on Vasilievskiy. The Penguins average 29.0 shots/game, that second game is what TB will be looking to replicate to keep the Pittsburgh offense quiet by limiting what the explosive Pittsburgh offense can generate. It’ll be a strong and fun matchup, since the Pens are flying and have scored 13 total goals in their two games this week.
Playoff implications nearly absent today
A lot of models from HockeyStats to TheAthletic have the Islanders, Blue Jackets and Flyers all headed for the 95-96 point range. That makes today almost like a house money situation for the Penguins, who should still be on track to easily clear that regardless of today’s results. For as crucial as the games against NYI and Detroit were earlier, the stress is eased for now on the Penguins with where they’re at in the standings and projected to go.
And now for the Pens
Projected lines
FORWARDS
Egor Chinakhov – Sidney Crosby – Rickard Rakell
Anthony Mantha – Tommy Novak – Evgeni Malkin
Avery Hayes – Ben Kindel – Justin Brazeau
Elmer Soderblom – Connor Dewar – Noel Acciari
DEFENSEMEN
Parker Wotherspoon / Erik Karlsson
Sam Girard / Kris Letang
Ryan Shea / Connor Clifton
Goalies: Stuart Skinner and Arturs Silovs
Potential Scratches: Bryan Rust*, Rutger McGroarty, Ilya Solovyov, Blake Lizotte (injured), Kevin Hayes, Ryan Graves, Ville Koivunen
IR: Filip Hallander, Jack St. Ivany
- The Penguins didn’t practice yesterday before heading out to make the trip, we’ll have to wait for today to see if Rust is able to play tonight. If so, Hayes will likely get bumped out of the lineup and some of the top-three lines will get shaken up.
- Similarly, the goalie question is still out there for how long the Pens will be faithful to their rotation. Last week they gave Skinner two starts in a row for the first time in a while, as the playoffs near it’ll be interesting to see if they start making him more of the primary option in net.
- Rickard Rakell (6G+2A) is on a five-game point streak.
Sid seeks seventh
Sidney Crosby will be moving on up in the all-time rankings with his next two points to tie and pass Steve Yzerman
Rank Player PTSRank Player PTS
1 Wayne Gretzky 2,857 5 Ron Francis 1,798
2 Jaromir Jagr 1,951 6 Marcel Dionne 1,771
3 Mark Messier 1,887 7 Steve Yzerman 1,755
4 Gordie Howe 1,850 8 Sidney Crosby 1,754
Once Crosby hits 1,756 he will also be in second place all-time for most points by a player with a single franchise, trailing only Mr. Hockey Gordie Howe’s 1,809 points recorded as a Red Wing.
Crosby needs three more points to clinch a 21st consecutive season of a point/game and extend his own NHL record.
Some other various milestones and potential happenings tonight:
- Soderblom set to appear in 100th career NHL games
- Bryan Rust (498) looking to become 11th player to score 500 points as a Penguin
- Evgeni Malkin (1,399) looking to become 23rd player in NHL history with 1,400 points
- Egor Chinakhov (18) looking for first career 20-goal season
- Anthony Mantha (58) is approaching the 60-point plateau for the first time
