What is the story about?
Let’s talk about some first impressions from the 2026-27 Pittsburgh Penguins.
After playing a nearly flawless 60 minutes in the season opener against the Philadelphia Flyers, the Penguins won a 6-5 overtime game against the Montreal Canadiens that saw them let a 5-1 slip away, and then played what was easily their sloppiest and ugliest game of the season on Monday night in a 3-2 loss to the Winnipeg Jets.
It has only been three games.
Everybody’s story for the 2026-27 season is still in it prologue,
especially as everybody tries to deal with the shortened preseason and training camp. It is going to make one of the noisiest and most random parts of the season even noisier and more random. But it is still a first impression, and sometimes a first impression can tell you a lot.
So let’s look at three things to like so far from the Penguins, and three things to not like so far.
Things to like so far
- You should like Ben Kindel’s start. Not only in the sense that he looks bigger, stronger and faster, but also with the way he looks offensively. He has played two games, he has scored two goals, both of them by going to the front of the net and getting his stick on the puck, and added an assist. We know he can shoot, we know he can skate, and we know he can see the ice. But if he is going to start scoring dirty goals from the front of the net you are really going to have something here. His play to set up Declan Carlile on Monday night was also one of the bright spots in the game for the Penguins. He knew exactly what he was doing with that puck, and where he was going with it, before he even had it. As promising as all of that is, I thought one of his best plays over the first two games was a scoring chance he generated on the penalty kill in his first game against the Canadiens. It did not result in a goal, but it showed off the speed and strength we have been hearing about all training camp. We know he is an NHL player. The question is the upside and how good of an NHL player he can be. We might be underselling it.
- You should like Declan Carlile’s start. Parker Wotherspoon and Ryan Shea were very pleasant surprises for the 2025-26 Penguins, and when they let Shea go without even so much as a serious offer, and then traded Wotherspoon for Kaedan Korczak, there was some confusion, and maybe even concern among Penguins fans. I still like Korczak (even with an up-and-down start), but I really liked the Carlile signing and saw him as not only a potential Wotherspoon replacement, but perhaps even an upgrade next to Erik Karlsson. While I do not expect offense to be a big part of his game, already scoring two goals and adding two more assists in three games is an unexpected surge offensively. He has, quite literally, already set a new career high in scoring. And both goals were fantastic shots as well. I still wouldn’t expect big offensive numbers this season from him, but I do expect a good player.
- You should like Evgeni Malkin’s start. He did not have a great game on Monday, but who did other than Kindel and, for the most part, Sergei Murashov? He did, however, have two outstanding games against Philadelphia and Montreal to start the season. I do not know how he is going to hold up over 84 games and what the April version of Malkin will look like, but through the first week of the season there is still some juice to squeeze here.
Things to not like so far
- You should not like seven third period goals against in two games. I realize it might be a little odd to put a defensemen in the “things to like” category given some of the goal prevention issues over the past two games, but I’m not going to put that entirely on just the defense. It has been a very collective effort across the board, and continuing what was a big problem a year ago. The good news? They mostly figured it out last season as the season went on. Right now it’s been four shaky periods (the third period against Montreal, and the bad game against Winnipeg). The positives have still outweighed the negatives. But the negatives are something we saw a little too much of a season ago.
- You should not like Connor Dewar’s start. Since being acquired at the 2024-25 NHL Trade Deadline, Dewar has been a very pleasant surprise as a fourth-line forward and penalty killer, and even played his way into a contract extension. It was justified given his play. But the past two games have been shaky for him in terms of making simple plays with the puck, and the type of plays you should be counting on him to make in tough, defensive situations. He has had some egregious turnovers in the defensive zone. I understand the Penguins probably want him in the lineup due to his penalty killing, but given the forward depth they have accumulated, including players that are more than capable of playing a fourth-line role when everybody is healthy (Hendrix Lapierre, Elmer Soderblom) he should not have a lock on a lineup spot every night.
- You should not like how the Penguins power play responded to an aggressive penalty kill. This is not a commentary on the power play’s overall performance through three games, because they scored four goals in the first two games. This is simply related to how they looked on Monday night against a Winnipeg penalty kill that was extremely aggressive and did not give them any room to operate or set up. Even when the Penguins power play is going well it has always been vulnerable to chances against, and can at times look a little sloppy. That is especially true against teams that do not just passively sit back and let them set up. Winnipeg’s two PK’s on Monday were highlighted by an aggressiveness they did not see from Philadelphia and Montreal, and the Penguins did not seem to know how to handle it. Maybe it was just an extension of the sloppy game they played. Maybe it is a thing other teams will try to exploit. Either way, it was something that stood out to me.
