CRANBERRY, Pa. -- You know how the Penguins have struggled to score on the power play for most of this season?
Turns out there's a pretty obvious answer to that problem, as they discovered late in their 5-3 victory at Detroit Saturday night.
All the Penguins have to do is get their opponents to play without a goaltender.
It certainly worked against the Red Wings who, facing a 4-3 deficit with the third period winding down, replaced goalie Jonathan Bernier with an extra attacker, even though they had been caught with too many men on the ice at 18:14.
So when John Marino drove a shot into Detroit's vacated net at 19:51, the Penguins had not only a victory, but their first man-advantage goal in five games.
Who knew it could be so simple?
Unfortunately for the Penguins, though, circumstances that prompt other teams to pull their goalie when they're shorthanded are pretty rare, so they'll probably have to hit upon a more conventional solution.
That explains why they spent part of their 50-minute practice today working on the power play, which featured a No. 1 unit with Kris Letang and Justin Schultz at the points and Evgeni Malkin, Jake Guentzel and Bryan Rust up front.
"I think we've got the five best players on the ice, given the group we have right now, with the way they're playing " Mike Sullivan said. "That's part of the reason why the personnel group is the way it is."
Two regulars on the top power play, Sidney Crosby and Patric Hornqvist, are recovering from significant injuries, and everyone now on it except Guentzel has missed at least nine games this season because of medical issues.
That's compelled Sullivan and his staff to do a lot of mixing-and-matching with personnel, but the frequent makeovers don't fully explain why the power play has consistently underachieved in 2019-20.
"The guys who are used on the power play (now) are pretty much guys who have been around a while and who are familiar with each other and are all pretty skilled players," Rust said.
Nonetheless, the power play enters the Penguins' game against Montreal Tuesday at 7:08 p.m. at PPG Paints Arena with a conversion rate of just 16.1 percent, which ranks 23rd in the NHL. Marino's goal marked only the third game during the past nine in which they scored with the extra man; they were 4-for-32 during that stretch.
"We know we have to be better," Guentzel said. "It's not like we're where we want to be."
No one denies that success rate is poor, by any standard. And for a team with as many gifted offensive players as the Penguins have, it's almost inexplicable, although Sullivan offered a laundry list of factors that have contributed to its struggles.
"It boils down to everything from execution and effort (to) decision-making," he said. "All of those things are part of it."
His solution, not surprisingly, is to distill the power play to its fundamentals: Getting pucks and people to the net. Doing that increases the chances of getting a rebound or deflection, or even a lucky bounce, that becomes a goal.
"We're trying to simplify the game a little bit on our power play," Sullivan said. "We're trying to shoot the puck a little bit more and get some net traffic and see if we can't create some opportunities that way."
The Penguins scored at least one power-play goal in five of their first six games and got one in four of six games during one recent stretch, but the momentum they generated couldn't be sustained.
"We've had moments where we thought we were gaining traction, we scored a few goals," Sullivan said. "And then we take a step back."
When that happens, a power play can suffer a collective crisis of confidence that only compounds its troubles.
"When things are going well, everybody's (simply reacting and) not thinking out there," Rust said. "They're just moving to open areas and making plays, taking shots when they're available. When things start to go sour, you start to maybe second-guess yourself and hesitate a little bit, which isn't the best."
The Penguins' ineffectiveness on the power play has not had a major impact on their record (17-9-4) or, for that matter, their overall offensive output.
They are scoring an average of 3.4 goals per game, which places them sixth in the league.
"Obviously, I think our power play can be better, and will be better," Schultz said. "But at even-strength, I'm not surprised at how we've produced."
And he probably won't be if the power play begins to perform to expectations, perhaps beginning when it faces a Canadiens penalty-killing unit that ranks 28th in the NHL
"If you get at least one or two, you get confidence," Guentzel said. "You just have to find a way to get that one."
Seems like another of those obvious solutions.
• Marino continues to receive rave reviews from his teammates and coaches. "Some guys, their games, for whatever reason, are better suited for the pro style of play," Sullivan said. "He might be one of those guys. H'e really strong on the puck. His mobility is, I think, one of his biggest strengths. He closes on people, defensively. He's got a real good stick, and then he's strong enough ... to win puck battles. I think he's getting better, every game he plays."
• Defenseman Chad Ruhwedel did not participate in the practice because of illness. His status for the Montreal game is not known.
• Here are the personnel combinations Sullivan used during the workout:
Jake Guentzel -- Evgeni Malkin -- Bryan Rust
Dominik Kahun -- Jared McCann -- Brandon Tanev
Zach Aston-Reese -- Teddy Blueger -- Dominik Simon
Alex Galchenyuk -- Sam Lafferty -- Stefan Noesen
Kris Letang -- John Marino
Jack Johnson -- Justin Schultz
Marcus Pettersson -- Jusso Riikola
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