Kapanen appears likely to be scratched vs. Golden Knights

If the personnel combinations the Penguins used in Thursday's practice at PPG Paints Arena are any indication, Kasperi Kapanen will likely be a healthy scratch for Friday's game against the Golden Knights.

When the Penguins took line rushes, Kapanen wasn't on his usual spot on Evgeni Malkin's wing, Evan Rodrigues was.

Kapanen was rotating in on the fourth line, taking turns skating in place of Zach Aston-Reese and Brian Boyle.

When the practice transitioned to special teams work, Kapanen wasn't on the second power play unit, either. He rotated in with the penalty-killing unit working against the second power play unit, something you often see done by players who aren't in the regular lineup.

This would be Kapanen's first healthy scratch of the season. He's been demoted to the bottom-six at times throughout the year, and has struggled to be effective in either a top-six or bottom-six role. He has just two assists in his last 17 games.

It looks like the next demotion is to the press box.

"I think the world of Kappy, I think the world of all of our players," Mike Sullivan said. "We're trying to make decisions that give the team the best chance to win. And we're trying to help all of our players maximize their potential."

Sullivan remains hopeful that Kapanen will find his game, and said that he's had a "number of conversations" with Kapanen about what he needs to do to help himself moving forward.

It all comes down to just "playing the game the right way."

"That entails a lot of things," Sullivan said. "It starts with a certain competitive spirit. But it's also attention to detail, it's being good on the wall, it's making sure that you win puck battles, it's going to the net, it's shooting the puck when the opportunity presents itself. It's defending and knowing what your role is amongst the group of five out there in each particular zone and what your responsibilities are. That helps us with collective effort, it makes us hard to play against as a team. So there's a lot that that's involved with it."

Kapanen's scratch could serve as a wakeup call that could lead him in the direction that the Penguins want him to play. Sullivan called it the "art of coaching" to make sure that they get that kind of response from Kapanen, rather than hurting his confidence any further.

"Sometimes players need words of encouragement, sometimes tough love is helpful to a player," Sullivan said of approaching situations like these. "And I think as a coach, we're trying to do our very best to help these guys and give them what we think they need at that particular time."

Elevating Rodrigues to Kapanen's spot also provides an opportunity for Rodrigues to get his offensive game going again, after a dramatic cool-off in his production. After scoring 15 goals and 15 assists in his first 33 games of the season, he has just one goal and four assists in his last 25 games, having taken on a more defensive, bottom-six role as of late.

"You try to create offense and you're expected to produce when you're in the top six," Rodrigues said. "You have a little bit more offensive creativity in your game. I think the key to just having success is being hard on pucks. When you get in the zone, you just kind of let your talent take over, and you look to make plays. And that's what I'll try to do."

MORE FROM PRACTICE

• Today was Mike Matheson's first day back at practice as he recovers from an undisclosed upper-body injury, and he was already a full participant with contact. He didn't take regular line rushes, and skated on an extra defense pairing with P.O Joseph. Sullivan said that he'd consider Matheson "day-to-day" at this point, and added that they'll see how he responds overnight to the practice and make decisions from there.

Matheson's last game was on Feb. 24 against New Jersey, and he said that the injury actually happened a couple of games before that. He tried to play through it, but things didn't feel right, so he and the team "felt like we should take a take a bit more serious look at it."

Tristan Jarry called Matheson's presence at practice "huge."

"He's a great player, great skater," Jarry said. "I think he adds some offense to our game. I think he's a good, puck-moving defenseman. He puts a lot of pucks on net, I think that helps for guys in front of the net for second opportunities that helps boost our scoring."

• The Penguins used these lines and pairings:

Jake Guentzel - Sidney Crosby - Bryan Rust
Danton Heinen - Evgeni Malkin - Evan Rodrigues
Dominik Simon - Jeff Carter - Brock McGinn
Brian Boyle - Teddy Blueger - Zach Aston-Reese/Kasperi Kapanen

Brian Dumoulin - Kris Letang
Marcus Pettersson - John Marino
Mark Friedman - Chad Ruhwedel
Mike Matheson - P.O Joseph

• Sullivan said that the coaching staff has had conversations about breaking up Crosby's line, as effective as it has been, in an effort to spark other lines.

"It's not a foregone conclusion that we're not willing to adjust Sid's line in order to try to create a more balanced attack," Sullivan said. "We've certainly had that conversation, that's always on the table. That's something that we've considered for a little while now. We haven't to this point because we felt as though his line has been so dominant. We're trying to find other combinations that we think can provide the balance for us throughout the rest of our lineup, but it's certainly a discussion that we've had and we continue to have."

• The first power play unit remained the same: Kris Letang, Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Jake Guentzel, Bryan Rust

• The second power play unit was Marcus Pettersson, Jeff Carter, Danton Heinen, Dominik Simon, Rodrigues

• Todd Reirden rejoined the Penguins behind the bench for Tuesday's game against the Panthers, his first game since undergoing knee surgery on Feb. 14. He was back at practice for the first time Thursday, though he's not back on the ice yet. He stood on the bench for the session, and players would gather in front of him as he drew on the whiteboard.

• The Penguins landed college free agent forward Corey Andonovski. More on him here.

• After practice the Penguins recalled Valtteri Puustinen from Wilkes-Barre/Scranton. Puustinen is Wilkes-Barre's leading scorer with 17 goals and 17 assists in 53 games. Puustinen was among the players I spoke with director of player development Scott Young about earlier this week, you can read what he had to say here.

• Congratulations to Phil Kessel on the birth of his daughter: