Pittsburgh Penguins: Mike Sullivan needs to take a look in the mirror

After costing his Pittsburgh Penguins in Game 3 against the Montreal Canadiens, head coach Mike Sullivan needs to be better.

If the Pittsburgh Penguins plan on advancing to the round of 16, everyone in their bubble must take a look in the mirror. Simply put, last night’s collapse was embarrassing. It all starts with their bench boss, Mike Sullivan.

I’ll preface by saying I still feel that Sullivan is a good coach. Not great. But he is not above criticism. Right now, he is not playing the best 18 skaters on the Penguins roster. It is nothing new.

Mind you, he has not been dressing the best skaters on this roster for about a year and a half. Dressing Matt Cullen over Teddy Blueger last postseason was clearly the wrong decision. After scratching Jack Johnson for Game 1 of the Islanders series (a game that the Penguins controlled from a territorial standpoint), he put Johnson back in the lineup for Game 2. The Penguins postseason record of 1-6 over this timespan speaks for itself.

More from Puck Prose

• Detroit Red Wings 2023 Rookie Camp Has Plenty of Ups and Downs
• This Columbus Blue Jackets rookie doesn’t want to be forgotten
• 2 trades the Boston Bruins must make to secure the Stanley Cup
• 3 reasons the Avalanche won’t win the Stanley Cup in 2024
• This is a big year for Alex Turcotte and the Los Angeles Kings

In the early portion of the 2019-20 season, I felt that he was doing some of his best work yet behind the Penguins bench. I felt he was in the running for the Jack Adams Trophy. There were a plethora of injuries and he guided this team to becoming one of the best defensive squads in the league. Their underlying metrics and shot suppression numbers were excellent.

However, as the season progressed, Sullivan’s decision making became more questionable. In the wake of injuries to Brian Dumoulin and John Marino, he elevated Jack Johnson to the top pair alongside Kris Letang.

In a nutshell, Sullivan making that decision is likely the biggest reason that the Penguins are playing in this qualifying round, rather than the round-robin. If you recall, the Penguins struggled and went on a six-game losing skid during this stretch.

I had thought much higher of Sullivan until he made that decision. He has put his eggs in an awfully odd basket of late. Seemingly enough, chosen to die on the hill of Jack Johnson and Justin Schultz. While I do not expect him to publicly blast them, calling them “good players” is woefully incorrect. They are not. Sullivan is wrong. The numbers prove it. The video confirms it. Myself and many others have said and written this for months on end.

Together, this pair was on the ice for two of the four Montreal goals last night. Johnson was also out there for the Canadiens powerplay goal. While it is not all entirely their fault, they are just in no-mans land. Both of them wound up on the ice at a point. They are a disaster.

As you can see, they end up on the same side of the ice. Crosby and Guentzel are providing better defensive coverage than Johnson and Schultz are. It is laughable how bad they are.

That pair is not working out. It never has. It never will. Every properly informed observer of these Penguins has been beating this dead horse for months, perhaps longer. It must change.

Sullivan needs to finally hold himself accountable here. The decision of sticking with this pair is costing this team in an enormous way. It is playing a large part in holding them back from contending with Tampa Bay and Boston in the East. Blast these two to the moon. It is wasting the generational talents on this roster.

I know it may surprise you, but Sullivan is indeed capable of healthy scratching skaters based on the merit of poor performance. It happened last night with Jared McCann. It is woefully overdue with Johnson.

Let’s talk about McCann. He has not scored a goal since January. He was practicing on the top power-play unit during training camp. Coaches and teammates tried to boost his confidence by speaking positively about him to the media. He was worthy of being health scratched last night. That was not where the Penguins made their mistake.

Dressing Sam Lafferty over Evan Rodrigues was the mistake. Rodrigues is the more proven player. He is a more versatile and much better skater than Lafferty. As you will see below, Lafferty’s regular-season isolated offensive impact was abysmal.

Per Natural Stat Trick, Pittsburgh’s third line (which included Lafferty) last night had an expected goal share of 11%. They got outchanced 5-1. That poor performance is not surprising. McCann has not worked. Lafferty has not worked. Rodrigues needs to draw in for Game 4. This may seem reactionary, and maybe it is. But the Penguins margin for error is smaller than normal. At the very least, their third line needs to control territory at a higher rate. Ideally, you would get tangible production from them. Pittsburgh is getting neither.

As we all witnessed, Bryan Rust had a breakout season from an offensive standpoint. He led this team with 8 power-play goals. His 17 power-play points were second only to Evgeni Malkin. The Penguins’ power play was abysmal in the first two games of this series. The fact that Rust was not even on that top power-play unit is utterly bizarre.

After Game 2, Sullivan cited that there was room for improvement in terms of offensive zone entries with the top powerplay unit. That was a fair assessment. I can tell you with 100% certainty that Rust is sure as hell a better option in general and in terms of entries than a declining Patric Hornqvist. Also, Jake Guentzel is a better net-front option than Hornqvist. Rust needs to be on that top unit. Not Hornqvist. Not Justin Schultz. That is the bottom line. It is inexcusable.

Sullivan is utilizing Hornqvist and Schultz as he did back in 2017. The reality is that they are not the same players today as they were then. There are better options for the top powerplay unit.

Unless the proper adjustments are made, there Penguins do not appear to be on a Stanley Cup path. Since the spring of 2019, the fringes of Sullivan’s decision-making appears to be biased. If a 22-year-old college student can look at this roster and analyze it objectively from the “40,000-foot view” that Sullivan often cites, he should be able to do the same.

Sullivan needs to objectively consider the data, video, and get back to making the right decisions on a consistent basis for this team. We know he is capable of it. We’ll see what adjustments are made for Game 4 on Friday night. Thanks for reading!