OTTAWA -- OK, so here's how this works: If Mike Sullivan declares that the Earth is flat, then we burn all our textbooks and begin anew.
If Sullivan declares that jaywalking should be banned from Downtown Pittsburgh, then we finally install light bulbs in all those Walk/Don't Walk signs.
Heck, if Sullivan declares that Gary Bettman's NHL has the most competent, consistent officiating in all of professional sports ...
... eh, you got my point before that, right?
Good, because this particular point's never been pounded home with more authority, with more conviction than what this extraordinary coach just displayed Friday night by going against a wheat-field's load of grain in pushing his Penguins to a prodigiously complete performance against the Senators in Game 4 of the Eastern Conference final at Canadian Tire Centre.
Final score: 3-2
Series tied: 2-2
Sullivan's record after playoff losses: 12-2
"What he says goes," Olli Maatta would tell me afterward with a playful grin. "He's the boss."
Yep. And he's right until he's proven wrong.
The Penguins needed goals in the worst way, with only nine in their previous six games. So he turned his focus on the resident superstar, planting Sidney Crosby near the crease on the power play and admonishing him -- again and again, on and off the ice -- to shoot the puck.
So, on this night, he did that, again and again. With his first shift, he showed probably his boldest stride of the series, aggressively swinging wide on Marc Methot at the Ottawa blue line, then starting a cycle below the goal line with Jake Guentzel. With his second shift, Crosby again whisked down the right side, this time with a pair of options to his left. He eschewed them both, put his head down and whipped a wrister that Craig Anderson gloved.
Big deal?
Better believe it was, considering he had six total shots through the first three games. And the group wasn't about to start scoring goals without the league's leading goal-scorer even attempting that.
"He was shooting the puck early," Chris Kunitz observed. "Any time he had it on his stick, he was flying with it. You know right from the start that he's got it going, and you just want to give him the puck and let him do his thing."
Kunitz did that. So did Guentzel. And that's where the coach comes into view again, because that was his primary purpose in shaking up all four forward lines, to get Kunitz -- old faithful -- back with Crosby to ensure he'd be thinking shoot first, last and always.
It soon paid off with Crosby setting up Maatta on an authoritative rush, then scoring from the right lip:
Took a couple of weird whacks, but no one complained. The captain was back.
"If shots are there, you want to take them," Crosby would say with a slight shrug. His five shots were his highest total since way back in Game 1 against the Capitals. "You don't want to pass up good opportunities. When you get in certain areas, especially against these guys, you want to make sure you get the shot off."
Point, Sullivan.
The coach made many other moves, any of which individually would have been fairly significant on any other night. He bumped up Scott Wilson to skate with Evgeni Malkin and Phil Kessel and offer a bumping presence. He similarly bumped up Carter Rowney, maybe his most dependable forward of the series, to the third line. And in dumping the seven-defensemen lineup, he added baby-faced Josh Archibald to the fourth line for the first playoff game of his life.
The kid earned every bit of his 8:11 ice time, too, and it was easy to tell from our brief talk he wasn't exactly blown away:
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