After Thursday's morning skate Mike Sullivan was asked what he thought the line of Zach Aston-Reese, Teddy Blueger, and Brandon Tanev brought to the Penguins' lineup, with Aston-Reese on the verge of making his season debut, fully recovered from his offseason shoulder surgery.
"They were a real conscientious line defensively for us (last season)," Sullivan said. "We can play them in a lot of defensive situations, they can play against anyone. I think they're all a little bit different as far as what they bring to the line. Teddy is a real cerebral center iceman -- he has good awareness defensively, he has an offensive aspect to his game. Tanev has a lot of speed and a real physical dimension to his game. And Zach is another smart player who has good awareness defensively, and he's another guy who can go to the netfront and can play in the battle areas, he's strong on the walls."
In their first game together this season, a 4-3 shootout win over the Islanders, we saw much of what made that line so successful last season.
If you remember the practice story from Monday, Aston-Reese's first practice back on that line, I wrote about how two metrics -- one that shows the way that line was deployed, and another that tells you which team was controlling the play -- illustrate how good that line was at their role last season:
That line -- technically the fourth line last year, although they played third-line minutes -- was deployed primarily in a defensive role in five-on-five last year. They only had 70 offensive zone faceoffs all season, compared to 194 in the defensive zone.
They were extremely effective in that defensive role. They had a slight edge in all shot attempts taken while they were on the ice, with the Penguins controlling 50.15 percent of all attempts when they were on the ice. They were very effective in the high-danger areas of the ice surrounding the net, with the Penguins controlling 57.14 percent of all high-danger attempts when their line was on the ice. The actual goals that occurred when that line was on the ice was even, with 10 goals scored by the Penguins and 10 goals scored against. That's what you want for a line in that role.
The line was so good defensively that even though the majority of their starts off of a faceoff came in their own zone, they controlled most of the offense because of how well they possessed the puck.
That same trend continued in their first game this season.
At five-on-five, that line was the Penguins' most successful line when it came to the differential in shot attempts taken when they were on the ice, with the Penguins taking 10 shot attempts and the Islanders taking eight in the 11:46 of five-on-five time. In terms of actual shots on goal, they were still the most effective, with that line seeing six shots for and three against. This comes despite the fact that their line was tied with the fourth line for the lowest rate of offensive zone starts on the team, at 50 percent -- not quite as low as they experienced last season, but still the lowest on the team.
And a big part of why the line did so well in this game was Aston-Reese. While it was Aston-Reese's defensive game that stood out the most in the line's success this season, it was his offense that stood out today.
Aston-Reese was tied for the second-most shots on goal of any Penguins player in this game with five, a fact that apparently wowed Bryan Rust when I mentioned it in the post-game press conference:
He was able to convert on one of those attempts with a tying goal in the second period:
"Originally I was looking to go out the other side and maybe make a pass," he said on the television broadcast of his goal. "I turned my head to the right and didn't see anybody. I was fortunate enough to jam it home on the second chance."
In the play leading up to the goal, Aston-Reese won a puck battle behind the net, something Sullivan was hoping to see more of from their line.
"That's something that coach kind of talked about with our line," he said of the play that led to his goal. "Keeping it simple, trying to create chances from shots from outside, drive to the net, and just playing behind their D. We kind of stuck to that tonight, I think we had a few chances where we put it behind their D and we were able to get the puck back and create some offense."
Aston-Reese had another solid chance at another goal earlier in the game off of a shorthanded rush alongside Mark Jankowski:
Mike Sullivan was impressed by the play of the third line, and what Aston-Reese brought to it in his first game back.
"I thought they had a great game, all three of them," he said after the win. "They bring a lot of energy. They've played a fair amount together, as you guys know. So I think they have some chemistry, there's a comfort level there. For Zach to come in and score a goal in his first game after having not played for six-plus months, that's not an easy challenge. And I thought he did a real good job. He kept the game simple, he played within himself, and the goal he got was huge for us."
It might be easy to say that Aston-Reese's strong season debut might just be a result of having an extra jump in his step from the feeling of playing for the first time after being out so long. But there's actual reason to believe that Aston-Reese's game takes a big step forward this season, and it's because of that shoulder surgery.
Aston-Reese said in the above video clip that he felt good physically in the game, his first game in six months. That alone is an improvement.
After practice last week, Aston-Reese disclosed that the issue with his shoulder dated back to an injury sustained the spring of his first season in the league, calling that injury the "catalyst." He said that surgery wasn't necessary at the time, but that his shoulder weakened more over the last two years until the point where it was causing issues in his game that he couldn't keep playing through.
"I just finally needed to take care of it," he said.
For most of his NHL career up until this point, Aston-Reese had been playing with a shoulder that limited his ability to play the way he wanted to.
"There was just hesitation," he said of his play before he got his shoulder fixed. "I know going into battles, if there was a battle or a fight or just kind of crosschecking around, I know there was a chance of my shoulder potentially slipping out. So to not have to worry about that anymore, to have that hesitation out of my game, it's huge for me, especially the way I play."
Aston-Reese picked up three hits in this game too, the third-most on the team, another sign that his shoulder is feeling just fine.
If that confidence with his shoulder can lead to more games for Aston-Reese like this one, it'll be a boost to the line that was already so successful last season.
