Maybe Mike Sullivan will change the zone entries, or make some other tactical adjustment.
Perhaps he'll ever consider making a personnel switch or two.
But after watching the Penguins' power play sputter and stumble through a 0-for-3 performance during a 3-2 overtime loss to the Flyers in an exhibition game at Scotiabank Arena in Toronto Tuesday, Sullivan knows there's at least one thing about the power play that he wants to change before his team begins its qualifying-round series against the Canadiens Saturday: Its results.
Not that an upgrade should be difficult. Based on the Flyers' game, the Penguins could bump their work with the extra man up several notches and still have it settle comfortably between awful and abysmal.
Considering that playoff games tend to be relatively low-scoring, which magnifies the importance of capitalizing on chances with the extra man, Sullivan's interest in improving the power play -- significantly and quickly -- is understandable.
The good news, for him, is that it can't get much worse than it was against the Flyers, unless it starts to yield shorthanded goals in bunches.
The Penguins routinely struggled to get across the Philadelphia blue line, and when the did make it in, scoring goals -- or even forcing goalies Carter Hart and Brian Elliott to make a save -- didn't seem to be high on their to-do list.
They generated a total of four shots on three power plays; Bryan Rust had one on the first try, Patric Hornqvist recorded two in quick succession on the second and Evgeni Malkin got one on the third.
Four shots, in six full minutes with an extra man.
In a game during which neither team ever led by more than a goal.
And while Justin Schultz got more time on the point with the No. 1 unit than Kris Letang -- something Sullivan said was primarily the result of Schultz being the more fresh of the two when the power plays began -- this was a group failing, not the shortcoming of any individual.
"We need to be a whole lot better," Sullivan said. "We've got a ways to go to get it firing on all cylinders. We all have to just go back to work tomorrow at practice and make sure we get better at it. I think it will improve. I know these guys are proud guys. They want it to be successful. For me, the solutions lie in simplifying the game. I don't think we move the puck as quickly as we needed to, and I don't think we were shooting the puck when we had opportunities to put the puck on the net. We'll go back to work with it and we'll get it moving in the right direction."
• Sidney Crosby had been considered questionable to play until he participated in warmups, but showed no signs of being affected by the unspecified physical issue that led to him sitting out several practices recently.
And while he did not record a point, Crosby contributed to Conor Sheary's goal at 5:06 of the opening period with a strong center drive to the net that forced a defenseman to go with him and opened space in the middle of the ice.
"Physically, I felt good," Crosby said. "I felt strong. I guess anticipating and making plays and that kind of stuff, that's just going to come with time. But for the most part, I felt really good."
• The Penguins seemed to make it through the game without any significant injuries, but got a scare while killing a too-many-men minor in the middle of the second period, when a Jakub Voracek shot slammed off the inside of Brian Dumoulin's left foot. Dumoulin was hobbled and clearly in pain, but stayed on the ice until there was a whistle.
He ended up playing 22 minutes, 12 seconds -- more than any Penguins defenseman except his partner on the No. 1 pairing, Letang -- and being credited with one quite painful blocked shot.
"It was just a stinger," Dumoulin said. "That's a tough place to get hit, in the foot." He added that, "it felt fine after that." That was fortunate for the Penguins, who found out what it was like to be without Dumoulin for an extended period when he was sidelined by a severed tendon in his ankle during the regular season.
• Crosby's return and Dumoulin's ability to stay in the game after absorbing that shot weren't the only good medical news for the Penguins. Jake Guentzel, in a game for the first time since having major shoulder surgery Dec. 31, showed few signs of his protracted time off the ice. Although he did not have a shot on goal Guentzel made a deft cross-ice feed to Sheary to set up the Penguins' first goal and played 18:59, more than any Penguins forward except Crosby.
"I thought it was a good first game for Jake," Sullivan said. "An exhibition game in this environment is very different than an intra-squad game that you have amongst yourselves. The intensity level is heightened even more. The fact that Jake hasn't played in a real hockey game in close to six (actually, seven) months, when you take all of those things into consideration, I thought he played extremely well. I think he's only going to get better as he gets more comfortable and gets his timing and all the subtleties that are so important to his game."
• Matt Murray, who got the start in goal, was not at the pinnacle of his game, but played well enough, stopping 10 of 12 shots during 29 minutes, 55 seconds of action, that he likely secured his spot as the go-to guy for Game 1 against Montreal.
Murray was beaten by a Sean Couturier shot that deflected off defenseman Marcus Pettersson and a Kevin Hayes backhander from close range that was made possible because of a ghastly giveaway by Malkin.
"I was able to feel the puck a little bit," Murray said. "And see some traffic, which was good."
Tristan Jarry, who entered the game midway through the second period as the Flyers were going on a power play, turned aside nine shots and was flawless until Scott Laughton beat him for the game-winner by chipping a shot over his blocker after getting behind the Penguins at 2:40 of overtime.
• Philadelphia was the league's best faceoff team during the regular season, controlling 54.6 percent of its draws, but you wouldn't have guessed that during the early stages of the first period, as the Penguins won seven of the first eight faceoffs. The Flyers' work at the dot improved over the course of the game, although the Penguins rallied to finish with a 29-28 edge, in large part because Crosby went 13-8.
Happily for the Penguins, Montreal isn't as good in that facet of the game as Philadelphia, ranking 12th in the league with a success rate of 50.4 percent. The Penguins were 25th at 48.9 percent.
• This surely didn't factor into anything the Penguins did -- or didn't do -- during the game, and it certainly doesn't make their defeat any more palatable, but it just might be that losing that game could be the best thing that could have happened to them. Especially when it was a game whose tangible significance fell somewhere between nil and none.
The simple truth is, the Penguins had experienced very little adversity during training camp, outside of Crosby's physical issue, and had seemed to be pleased with the way just about every aspect of their game had progressed during the two weeks before they traveled to Toronto Sunday. Being reminded that there are other good teams out there -- and what it feels like to be on the wrong side of a final score -- just might help them to sharpen their focus as they prepare for the opener of the Canadiens series.
• Could it be that the reason John Marino isn't a finalist for the Calder Trophy, which goes to the NHL's top rookie, is that people who watch him play don't realize he's a first-year pro?
If so, that's understandable, because he plays with poise and a level of responsibility that simply isn't often associated with guys breaking into the league, especially at his position. Marino showed his offensive abilities on the Penguins' first goal, when his long pass to Guentzel triggered the sequence that ended with Sheary beating Hart, and demonstrated his defensive-zone acumen midway through the third period when he used his stick to disrupt a two-on-one break that could have resulted in Philadelphia taking a two-goal lead. For the day, he logged 19 minutes, 14 seconds of ice time, including time on both special teams.
• This was the only exhibition game for either team, which might be why they were allowed to dress two extra skaters. For the Penguins, they were defenseman Chad Ruhwedel and forward Evan Rodrigues. If nothing else, those choices probably provide confirmation of who is at the top of the coaching staff's list of players to be added to the lineup if injuries and/or subpar performances force some personnel changes once the playoffs begin.
• The most intriguing personality in this rivalry, at least for now, wasn't involved in the game. Apparently wasn't even on the continent on which it was played.
No matter. Philadelphia forward Oskar Lindblom captured the attention of the hockey world with his battle against Ewing's sarcoma -- a cancer in which a tumor grows in bones or the tissues around them, in which he recently was declared the winner.
Lindblom celebrated his victory by signing a three-year, $9 million contract and securing a spot on the Flyers' 31-man postseason roster. He returned to Sweden to visit with his family when his teammates traveled to Toronto, but is scheduled to join them there fairly soon.
The wisdom of allowing a recent cancer patient to participate in a contact sport during a pandemic can be debated, but there's no disputing that Lindblom's off-ice triumph is one of hockey's leading feel-good stories of the season.
