The Penguins' fourth line and penalty-killers have taken a major personnel hit as of late with the losses of both Ryan Poehling and Josh Archibald due to injury.
One of those players could be back in the lineup as soon as the Penguins' game against the Devils on Friday evening at PPG Paints Arena.
Mike Sullivan deemed Poehling a "game-time decision" Friday for the first time since Poehling was sidelined on Dec. 20 against the Rangers with an upper-body injury. Poehling remains on the injured reserve list, but has fulfilled the seven-day minimum requirement and can be activated at any time.
I spoke with Poehling one-on-one after the Penguins' morning skate, and he said that Friday was the best he's felt in several weeks.
"I'm feeling great," he said. "Obviously I skated the last two days with the team and today in the morning skate, and I haven't felt this good in two, three weeks. It was promising for me. That progress is always something that feels good when you don't really know the timeframe of when you can return. But I'm feeling great."
Poehling's still not totally sure of that timeframe -- as of this morning, he hadn't spoken yet with the medical staff to know if he's cleared for a return.
Poehling left that Dec. 20 game against the Rangers about midway through the third period. His last shift ended near the 10-minute mark of that frame, and then he sat on the Penguins' bench for another two minutes or so before going back to the locker room for good. In rewatching Poehling's last shift that game, there's not anything obvious that happened to him that would have triggered him leaving. Poehling told me Friday that it wasn't anything that happened in that game at all, but rather something nagging he had been dealing with for quite awhile.
"It happened prior, around early December," Poehling said. "I think it was against Vegas. It was just nagging and nagging, and finally it was too much to play. I took a step back, and I'm glad we figured it out and now we're moving forward."
Poehling finished that game on Dec. 1 against the Golden Knights and played against the Blues two nights later, but was then sidelined with an upper-body injury that had him out until Dec. 10 against the Sabres. It was that same upper-body injury that sidelined him this time, but this time he was able to take the time to more fully heal before making his possible return.
Between both absences, Poehling got in a fair amount of skates with Penguins assistant coach (and former skills development coach) Ty Hennes, who always runs the smaller skates with injured players. Those skates were helpful not only for getting Poehling back up to good health, but also for allowing him time to focus on other areas of his game.
"He gives you a different perspective to the game," Poehling said. "Just skill-wise, you can work on that when you're not going full-speed in non-contact practices. It's nice to have him as the guy, he's great at what he does and it's fun to skate out there with him."
The impact of a Poehling return would be significant. The fourth line was one of the Penguins' stronger suits with both Poehling and Archibald on Teddy Blueger's wings, but that line has seen a noticeable dip in its effectiveness (and ice time) with both Poehling and Archibald out. The penalty-kill has remained effective in Poehling's absence, but what has been missing is Poehling's ability to add offense while shorthanded. Poehling averages the second-highest rate of both shot attempts and scoring chances for the Penguins while shorthanded this season, and he does that while maintaining the second-highest rate of hits on the penalty-kill among forwards. Poehling has also been responsible for putting the Penguins on the power play a fair amount this season -- he's drawn seven penalties, and has the third-best rate of penalties drawn relative to his ice time this season.
Sullivan acknowledged after the Penguins' morning skate during the trip to New York this week that the team was still "trying to figure out our bottom-six right now based on the health of our group." Getting Poehling back goes a long way toward that.
MORE FROM THE SKATE
• Chad Ruhwedel (upper-body) and Jeff Petry (wrist) both skated before the morning skate with Hennes. Petry was using a shorter stick and was only using it in his right hand, not his left.
• It was an optional skate. Participants were Poehling, Drake Caggiula, Mark Friedman, Drew O'Connor, Ty Smith and Casey DeSmith.
• Tristan Jarry will start.
• Ruhwedel and Archibald (lower-body) remain out tonight, their statuses haven't changed. Kris Letang is day-to-day with a lower-body injury and won't play tonight, which means that Smith will make his Penguins debut.
• The player who the Penguins sent out in the Smith trade, John Marino, won't play tonight for New Jersey. He was declared week-to-week with an injury on Dec. 23. Marino still made the trip to Pittsburgh -- it's the Devils' team dads trip -- and he watched the Penguins' morning skate from the visitors' bench. A couple of players and coaches in the skate stopped over to catch up with Marino.
"It was good to see him," O'Connor said with a smile when asked about Marino. "It's always good talking to him, he's a good guy. It was fun catching up."
TAYLOR HAASE / DKPS
Drew O'Connor and John Marino in the Penguins' optional morning skate on Friday
• If Poehling is good to go, my assumption would be that it's Caggiula who goes back down in order to clear the necessary roster spot to activate Poehling from injured reserve. O'Connor could be the player to come out of the lineup, but that would be a tough decision to make after the game he had on Wednesday.
"It felt good, it always feels good to chip in offensively," O'Connor said after the morning skate of his last game. "I thought (Teddy Blueger) and (Kasperi Kapanen) made great plays on that goal, a lot of credit to them. I think it's just continuing to play hard every shift and continuing to work like that."
O'Connor also thinks that his chemistry with Blueger is continuing to develop, after the two didn't see much time together before this season.
"It's been good," O'Connor told me. "I think we've been building (chemistry) a bit, we feed off of each other well. We've had some good looks the last few games, it's been great playing with him."
