Penguins

Penguins must make change on defense

Taylor Haase
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Paul Byron's second-period goal in Game 3. -- GETTY

The Penguins are on the brink of elimination from their qualifying round series against the Canadiens following Wednesday's 4-3 loss in Toronto. Friday's Game 4 is now a must-win situation.

The third defense pairing of Jack Johnson and Justin Schultz is far from being the only reason for that. Don't mistake criticism of that pairing for sole blame.

But at the same time, there's no reason that the pairing should be intact come Friday. Mike Sullivan has already made one personnel switch based on performance, healthy scratching Jared McCann on Wednesday in favor of Sam Lafferty after he "didn't feel like we were getting enough of an impact from that line."

If the third line's lack of an impact in the first two games was enough of a reason for a personnel change in Game 3, then the third pairing's negative impact should be reason for a change in Game 4.

The Canadiens have scored eight goals over a total of 145 minutes of 5-on-5 through the first three games of the series. Johnson has been on the ice for five of them in his 37 minutes of 5-on-5, Schultz has been on the ice for four of them in his 43 minutes of 5-on-5.

The pairing was on the ice for the opening goal from Shea Weber, the second goal from Jonathan Drouin, and Johnson (without Schultz) was on the ice for the tying goal by Paul Byron. Let's break them down.

The first goal wasn't solely the fault of the pairing, but they sure did look awful.

Johnson's mishandling of the puck in the Canadiens' zone starts the rush:

Johnson and Schultz inexplicably switch who they're covering as the play develops, so both are on their off sides:

Lafferty went too low and over-backchecked and left Weber wide open, so not everything can be blamed on the defensemen. But it was the defensemen who got them into that mess in the first place.

On the second goal, Drouin was Schultz's man, and Schultz didn't make much of an effort to make Drouin's job any more difficult. He appeared to try and tie up Drouin's stick after it was already too late:

The tying goal from Byron came when John Marino (who for the most part, has been solid this series) was caught on the ice with Johnson. Marino missed a hit and got beat wide by Byron, then Johnson also got beat:

Both Schultz and Johnson play on special teams, with Schultz on the power play and Johnson on the penalty-kill. If you had to scratch one of the two, Johnson is more easily replaced on the penalty-kill than Schultz would be on the power play, and Schultz has also just looked better as a whole this series.

If McCann can get scratched for the third line having minimal impact, then surely Johnson can get scratched for having a negative impact.

The Penguins have three other left-handed defensemen -- Juuso Riikola, Pierre-Olivier Joseph and Kevin Czuczman -- with them in the bubble, and at least Riikola would surely be an improvement over the current situation.

Putting Riikola in for Johnson wouldn't be the only necessary improvement that would get the Penguins through this series, but it would absolutely be a start.

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THE ESSENTIALS

• Boxscore
• Video highlights
• NHL scoreboard

THE INJURIES

• Nick Bjugstad is out for the remainder of the season after undergoing surgery to repair a herniated disc in late May.

• Dominik Simon is sidelined until November after undergoing shoulder surgery on April 29.

• Zach Trotman is being held out this summer with what sounds like a lingering injury.

THE LINEUPS

Sullivan’s lines and pairings:

Jake Guentzel — Sidney Crosby — Conor Sheary
Jason Zucker — Evgeni Malkin — Bryan Rust
Patrick Marleau — Sam Lafferty — Patric Hornqvist
Zach Aston-Reese — Teddy Blueger — Brandon Tanev

Brian Dumoulin — Kris Letang
Marcus Pettersson — John Marino
Jack Johnson — Justin Schultz

And for Claude Julien‘s Canadiens:

Tomas Tatar — Phillip Danault — Brendan Gallagher
Jonathan Drouin — Nick Suzuki — Joel Armia
Paul Byron — Jesperi Kotkaniemi — Artturi Lehkonen
Dale Weise — Max Domi — Jake Evans

Ben Chiarot — Shea Weber
Brett Kulak — Jeff Petry
Xavier Ouellet — Victor Mete

THREE STARS

1. Jeff Petry
Canadiens defenseman

Petry got the game-winner for the second time in three games into a tight space between Matt Murray's shoulder and the crossbar:

"When I got (the puck) I was looking for somebody on the back door," Petry said of his latest game-winner. "I saw a little opening above his shoulder, and there's no bad shot at this time of the year. I was able to pick my spot and got the goal."

Murray wasn't one of the three players made available after the game, but for another goaltender's perspective, Martin Biron thought the reason for the goal was less about Murray's positioning and more about Petry making a great, unexpected shot from a guy who isn't exactly a sniper:

2. Shea Weber
Canadiens defenseman

Weber opened the scoring with a goal of his own, and assisted on the goals from Jonathan Drouin and Paul Byron to tie the game.

Weber led the Canadiens with five shots on goal, and also recorded two blocked shots and two hits.

3. Paul Byron
Canadiens forward

Byron assisted on Weber's opening goal and scored the tying goal late in the second period.

BEHIND THE SCENES

• The Penguins used the Toronto Raptors locker room Wednesday night:

BY THE NUMBERS

• Lafferty is the second Western Pennsylvania native to play a playoff game for the Penguins. Ryan Malone was the first.

• Brandon Tanev and Lafferty led with four hits each.

• The Penguins outshot the Canadiens 33-31, and have now outshot them in all three games.

• This was the first game of the series in which Evgeni Malkin did not lead the team in shots on goal. He recorded just two. Jake Guentzel led with seven.

• Kris Letang had four giveaways. No other Penguins player had more than one.

MILESTONE WATCH

• Sidney Crosby's assist on Patric Hornqvist's goal was his 189th career postseason point, surpassing Joe Sakic and Doug Gilmour for eighth all-time in NHL postseason history. Next up is Brett Hull with 190 points, and Paul Coffey with 196 points.

• Malkin's assist on the Hornqvist goal was his 169th career postseason point. He's three points away from tying Mario Lemieux for second-all time in Penguins franchise history.

THEY SAID IT

• Crosby on what the Penguins need to do differently next game: "I think just holding onto pucks in their zone. I thought we did a better job of that in the first two games opposed to tonight. We've got to do a better job of that, putting them in their own zone and creating from that way."

• Crosby on mistakes: "This time of year those mistakes are magnified. They're opportunistic. They're waiting on those mistakes, and they capitalized on them. We might have been guilty of getting a little too loose there with the lead, and that changed pretty quick."

• Teddy Blueger on what allowed the Canadiens to come back: "We took our foot off the gas a little bit and momentum shifted, they were able to get those two goals. It was a pretty even third period but we gave up that one goal after the power play, and after that we just kind of couldn't find a way to climb back into it. It's tough to pinpoint one thing. I think we just didn't defend hard enough."

• Blueger on the team's frustration level after the loss: "It's definitely very, very disappointing. We had a pretty good first half of this game, had a two-goal lead. This time of year we've got to find a way to finish those out and close those games out. We just didn't do it. It should be a good lesson for us going forward. Not a whole lot of room for error here."

• Lafferty on his first playoff game: "I was obviously really excited, I feel like I've been playing well all through camp. I was just excited to get a chance and try to help the team. Obviously not the result that we wanted, but I just try to bring what I bring, my speed and my physicality. I think we'll regroup here and bounce back for the next game."

THE OTHER SIDE

• When the Penguins tried to pull Murray during their final power play for a 6-on-4 opportunity, they did so after the official had already called for the "home team" Canadiens to make their last line change. The officials made Murray go back onto the ice. Julien said after the game that he was the one who told the officials that the Penguins pulled Murray when they shouldn't have been able to do so.

"Yes, I called the referee, I said they can't make that change after you put your arm up and we make our change," he said. "I brought it to their attention, that's what happened."

• The Canadiens' three unanswered goals completed the organization's first multi-goal postseason comeback win since Game 1 of the 2008 conference semifinals against the Flyers.

• Petry is the first Canadiens defenseman with multiple game-winning goals in a single postseason since Chris Chelios scored two in 1989. He's the first Canadiens defensemen to do so in a single series since Serge Savard did so in 1976. Only J.C. Tremblay, who scored three game-winners for the Canadiens in 1971, has scored more game-winners in a single postseason among Canadiens defensemen.

• On Tuesday, Julien said the Canadiens needed more "will and determination" for Game 3. Brendan Gallagher thinks they showed just that.

"That's what these playoffs are about," Gallagher said after the win. "We're playing arguably the most experienced team in the league. We're learning. ... For our team to respond that way, I think it was a very positive sign going forward. That's something that throughout this journey we're on, we're going to look back on and get more and more experience as we go, and become even more dangerous."

• Julien said much the same when it came to his team's determination.

"We've just done it by working hard," he said. "At the end of the day, we know where the experience is. The only way we can counter that is with our work ethic and commitment and desire. I think we're a good-skating team, we've got a lot of potential. We lack experience compared to the other team, but we're trying to make it up with our compete level. So far it's given us a 2-1 lead. I'm going to say it again -- and I said it after our first win -- you're playing a team that knows exactly what to do to get back into a series. We're aware of that. We need to be playing our best game come Game 4 here. We've got to be ready. We can't get overconfident, but we've got to have the confidence to be able to close it off."

• Gallagher didn't participate in Wednesday's morning skate, evidently a little banged up. He was asked if he would have played with whatever he was dealing with had it been a typical October game.

"This is the Stanley Cup playoffs," he said with a smile. "Any chance you get to be in the lineup, as long as you help the team, you're going to be out there. I would never put myself in a situation where I'm going to hurt the team. Hopefully I was able to contribute tonight."

• Forward Jake Evans replaced Jordan Weal on the fourth line. Evans left the game after a hard (but clean) hit from Tanev that caused Evans to hit his head off of the glass. It looked like the impact caused Evans to cut his face on his visor. Julien said he didn't have an update on Evans' status after the game.

THE SCHEDULE

Game 4 is on Crosby's 33rd birthday, Friday at 4 p.m., and will be broadcast on AT&T SportsNet locally and NBCSN nationally. If a Game 5 if necessary, it will be on Saturday.

The draft lottery, which may or may not be relevant for the Penguins, will be on Monday. If the Penguins don't win the next two games and get eliminated, they get to decide whether to send their 2020 first-round pick or the 2021 first-round pick to the Wild, regardless of the outcome of the draft lottery.

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