Not to be that guy, but ... nah, not yet.
Sure, the Penguins shed that stupid, senseless six-game slide by outscoring the Senators, 7-3, on this sigh-of-relief Tuesday night at PPG Paints Arena. And no one should complain about the outcome in the slightest.
Nor did they.
"I thought we played hard, and I thought we played together," Bryan Rust would fairly assess after his hat trick stole the headline. "In a lot of instances, we were playing as a five-man unit and playing in their faces."
In a lot. But far from all.
I'll defer to Dave Molinari in delving into all that the home team didn't do well, other than to add that enough lingered to cast doubts as to whether they were more responsible for this score, or if it was Belleville's best from up north.
That said, there was definitely one player who got it. Who grasped and put into motion precisely the way the Penguins need to perform to get back to where they were through Christmas.
And oh, yeah, who'd whiled away most of his winter way up in St. Paul:
My goodness, Jason Zucker was outstanding.
To such a degree, actually, that I'm first showing you his goal -- the Penguins' fifth, 36 seconds into the third period and a relatively meaningless one aside from registering Sidney Crosby's 800th assist -- just to get it out of the way. And while I'm on the formalities, he'd also wind up with two assists of his own, three shots and, for the analytically inclined, an exemplary 60.0 Corsi For percentage at five-on-five, second among regularly used forwards only to the captain's 62.96.
Again, outstanding.
But I felt that way well before the goal, beginning with this:
Wonderful as it was to witness John Marino whipping home a wrister in his return from that frightening fractured cheekbone in Florida, none of it happens without Zucker showing serious smarts to set it up.
It was near the end of the game's opening shift, and his linemates, Crosby and Conor Sheary, had already gotten off. So Zucker, with possession outside the Ottawa blue line, decided not to relinquish it and instead shoved the puck toward Craig Anderson's blocker side.
With a purpose, it turns out.
"I knew our lines were changing, but I wanted to keep the pressure on him," Zucker told me, referring to Anderson. "And I knew that if I'd keep it to that side, at least I was gonna get some help quicker than going far side. So that was the decision I made. I wanted to make sure that Geno and those guys had a chance to get on and try to make a play."
Dude.
So Anderson, as he's done throughout his career, punches the puck into the left corner. Zucker outraces Ottawa center Artem Anisimov to the puck, whirls, battles on the boards and taps it to Evgeni Malkin, who feeds Marino.
But wait: Zucker then hustles so hard to the bench to complete the change that he becomes that rare player to record an assist without an accompanying plus. Because, hey, he was no longer on the rink when the goal was scored.
I've got more, but brew up some caffeine first, because these are boring:
That's Zucker initially backing off the Senators in the neutral zone, out of respect for his speed, then dishing to Sheary, who's coming that much faster. But rather than hoping Sheary manufactures something, he swoops in from behind for support -- exactly what Mike Sullivan had been passionately emphasizing in practice the previous day -- to carry the play deeper into the Ottawa zone.
"We just need to stay tighter, make sure we're on the puck and helping each other," Zucker would explain of that sequence, which I was surprised he recalled at all.
He recalled this next one, too, which was nice because it might've been my favorite:
Sheary's covering at the right point for a pinching Marcus Pettersson, and he takes a gamble by charging forward once Ottawa gains possession. But Zucker's immediate retreat upon that change of possession assures that once Sheary gets a piece of the Senators' Jayce Hawryluk, Zucker's right there to reclaim and, after a violent skate stop, he even keeps it in the zone.
"That's just coming high to cover," Zucker would explain with a shrug.
OK, so the next one's so boring I didn't even bother bringing it up:
Told you.
But you know who isn't bored by seeing a forward position himself responsibly to prevent easy zone entries?
Right ...
"I thought Jason was real good tonight, and I think he's been real good lately," Sullivan replied to my general question about his showing with the detailed work like what's above. "I think he has a better understanding of how to use and leverage his speed. I think he's starting to get some chemistry with Sid. ... And I think he's just getting more comfortable with how we're trying to play, with our overall game."
Comfortable?
Heck, he's doing it better than most of the players who'd been doing it all along. And I'm not just saying that because he's popped six goals in the 11 games since coming from the Wild.
"Honestly, there are things I'm still learning, things I'm doing wrong out there that I'm trying to fix through watching video of some of the plays like the ones you mentioned," Zucker told me. "But overall, I think it's good that we're gaining some chemistry as a line. It's a learning curve, a building process, not only for our line but the entire team."
A learning curve, the man says ...
... so just imagine when he finally stops, uh, falling flat on his face and figures out how do things right.
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