CRANBERRY, Pa. -- Dominik Simon, Jamie Oleksiak, Derick Brassard and Olli Maatta took their talents, as well as some suntan lotion, to South Beach.
Only there was no sun.
"Rained the whole time," Simon lamented when I asked how he spent the Penguins' weeklong break that wound down Sunday with a return to practice at the Lemieux Sports Complex. "Funny, we go to Miami, and we saw through the clouds for maybe 10 minutes."
Jack Johnson flew to Fort Lauderdale to visit family, and he encountered the same clouds but also couldn't get much sleep because of the blessing that is having young children bouncing around by sunrise.
Sidney Crosby, Kris Letang, Matt Murray and Garrett Wilson went way up to Wyoming, to one of the captain's mainstays in Jackson Hole. Only there wasn't much of a break for the two All-Stars, obviously, and even Murray had to deal with an erroneous local report that he'd been engaged.
Hockey, anyone?
Yeah, thought so.
It might not be much of a game Monday night at PPG Paints Arena, to put it mildly, since the Penguins and Devils have both been off since Jan. 19 because of the NHL's combined bye and All-Star periods. Nothing makes for an uglier brand of the sport quite like rust. But that doesn't mean all concerned won't be ready to embrace the restart at 7:08 p.m.
Or, for that matter, four games in the first six nights. Or a dozen games in the first 23 days of February.
"We're excited about it," Matt Cullen was saying. "We feel like we were playing some of our best hockey before the break, and we didn't finish strong like we'd hoped to."
He was referring, of course, to the 2-3 Western trip.
"But now we come back and refocus for the home stretch. What we need to do is what makes us successful and bring that on a consistent basis. It's about buying in. It's about doing the right things, whether you're feeling it or want to. It's about committing. Everything's within our reach, but we've got to commit."
"It's about to get busy," Murray said. "It's that time of year where you don't get too many practices because it's all games. It's a lot about recovery, getting the right rest, maintaining your habits. What you have to do more than anything is avoid laziness. For me, I just try to sharpen everything, move things forward in a positive direction."
Everyone participated in this practice except Crosby and Letang, the All-Stars flying back from San Jose, and the injured players, Justin Schultz and Zach Aston-Reese.
THE ESSENTIALS
THE COMBINATIONS
The Penguins didn't -- couldn't -- use full lines and pairings at practice with Crosby and Letang missing, but the formation of several drills strongly suggested they'll stay with what was used in Las Vegas:
Guentzel-Crosby-Rust
Kessel-Malkin-Hornqvist
Pearson–Brassard–Simon
Sheahan–Cullen–Wilson
Dumoulin–Letang
Maatta–Riikola
Pettersson–Johnson
(Oleksiak-Ruhwedel)
THE INJURIES
• Justin Schultz, defenseman, is out until February with a fractured leg, but he skated on his own beforehand.
• Zach Aston-Reese, right winger, is out indefinitely with a broken left hand. He also skated on his own beforehand, though he still couldn't grip a stick.
Sullivan assessed both injuries together, saying, "Both are probably more week-to-week than day-to-day," adding that both are "approaching joining the team for practices." Neither player's status has changed, he made clear.
THE SESSION
• All available players participated in an 50-minute, intensive but also occasionally loose -- breakaway competition -- set of drills. That included the neat four-corners passing drill Sullivan began using in Los Angeles ...
... in which the players on the perimeter are required to continuously pass the puck through the two defensemen in the middle.
• Going less than an hour is unusual after extended time off, but several players told me they'd been given specific guidelines for maintaining condition. In some cases, like Murray's, that was a simple as packing an exercise band and stretching all the necessary muscles at the recommended intervals.
THE OTHER SIDE
The Devils are having a rotten, injury-riddled season, 18-23-7 and next-to-last in the East. But they're 2-0 against this particular opponent, having beaten the Penguins, 5-1 and 4-2, in the first two weeks of November, a span in which those were their only two victories in an eight-game span.
"They've had our number, no question," Johnson said. "We're aware of that."
That said, the Devils won't have the NHL's reigning MVP, Taylor Hall, out since Dec. 23 with an injury the team isn't disclosing. Hall skated on his own for the first time today, but New Jersey coach John Hynes confirmed after practice in Newark that he wouldn't be accompanying the team to Pittsburgh. They'll also be without right winger Stefan Noesen and defenseman Ben Lovejoy, the latter having been placed on Injured Reserve today.
Left winger Miles Wood, out the past three games with an injury, practiced and will return.
Keith Kinkaid will start in goal.
THE SCHEDULE
Faceoff is at 7:08 p.m. tomorrow at PPG Paints Arena. The Penguins will skate at 10:30 a.m., the Devils an hour later.
THE COVERAGE
Visit our Penguins team page for everything.
