Kovacevic: Nothing will matter more this winter than the goaltending

Tried to give the guy a compliment. I really did.

Alex Nedeljkovic wanted nothing to do with it.

Third period. Tie game. The Red Wings' Lucas Raymond, a teammate of his this past winter, burst out of the box after serving a penalty for a red-line-in breakaway and ... oh, just press play:

Nice job, right? Or ... not?

“It wasn’t the right approach, I’ll tell you that," Nedeljkovic responded when I'd asked about that save, one of 22 made him the peak performer on either end of the Penguins' 2-1 preseason loss to the Red Wings on this Wednesday night at PPG Paints Arena. "I was trying to sell out five-hole. He’s got a pretty good five-hole move, so I was waiting on that. He didn’t go to it. Then, once he pulled it to his backhand, it was just kind of scramble mode. Tried to make myself big and get across the best I could.”

Which is, at the least, an effective approach at that stage, right?

“No, I needed to try to wait for him. I’m trying to out-wait him on any breakaway. Any rush like that, you’re trying to out-wait the guy as long as possible, take away his time, his space.”

But ... that eventually happened and ... oh, never mind. I gave up after that. 

I won't here, though. Because, even while acknowledging that Nedeljkovic might've been better prepared for the possibility that Raymond would eschew his preferred five-hole move -- hey, it's not like Raymond didn't have his own scouting book in reverse -- the fact remains that Nedeljkovic fought through that sequence to the finish. It didn't go smoothly at the start, but he did come across, he did take away that backhand, and he did keep his eyes locked forward even after the straddled save.

The fact also remains that this is who Nedeljkovic is. His technique's rooted more in fire and fury than ... um, being technical. He'll stray from the paint when he doesn't need to. He'll utilize his terrific puckhandling skills even when pressured. He'll swat rebounds out of mid-air for seemingly no reason, something he did twice on this evening alone.

And yeah, I had to ask, what was that?

“Just a reaction there," he'd answer with a smile. "Tough rebound in the middle, and just trying to get it out of there. … I don’t know. I don’t really like doing it. It means I’m not controlling the rebound.”

But here again, he got the result.

Look, the style's seldom pretty, and the same goes for the stats: He's got a healthy-for-a-backup .907 save percentage through 103 NHL games at age 27, but that figure dipped to .895 in 15 games with the Red Wings in 2022-23 and, not coincidentally, that regression included a return to the AHL. Everything's up, down and all-around.

And that ... won't be OK this winter. Not in this setting.

____________________

Which leads me to yet another fact that remains: If both Tristan Jarry and Nedeljkovic aren't their best selves over the coming months, beginning with the franchise's 56th season opener Tuesday night against the visiting Blackhawks, then nothing else about these Penguins will matter much, if at all.

Not the electrifying addition of Erik Karlsson.

Not living legends Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin continuing to produce a point a game.

Not those three, plus Kris Letang, Jake Guentzel and/or Rickard Rakell, operating the most star-studded power play seen in these parts since the everyone's-a-Hall-of-Famer 1990s.

Not the sudden infusion of actual smarts into the front office, with Kyle Dubas succeeding Ron Hextall.

Not all the damage Dubas has already undone, notably through a near-total transfusion of speed, savvy and grit into the third and fourth forward lines.

Here's why, at least from my perspective, and it reaches well beyond the obvious the importance of the goaltending position: As I see it, this team's not equipped to be become some superlative defensive dynamo, no matter how much Mike Sullivan stresses it, no matter how well the new bottom-six types fare, no matter how much back-end improvement might come of adding Karlsson and Ryan Graves. They just aren't.

As such, they'll need Jarry to rank among the top half-dozen goaltenders in the league. That'll sound lofty, even excessive, to most, I'm sure. But I've seen Jarry breathing that air before, over stretches spanning 2-3 months, so I don't have to wonder whether it's possible. There's precedent.

They'll also need Nedeljkovic to rank somewhere in the high 20s, I'd say. Or, to categorize it another way, among the best of the backups.

Neither was close, to be kind, last season. Jarry ranked 17th with a .909 save percentage, dragged for months by an injury that just wouldn't go away, and Nedeljkovic didn't even earn enough action to qualify. If he had, he'd have ranked 40th. Whereas Casey DeSmith, the backup he'll supplant, ranked 24th at .905.

Get the picture?

Sid and Geno, respectfully, aren't about to top a point-a-game pace by some massive margin. Karlsson isn't about to top 100 points again by some massive margin. It's a mostly older roster across the board, so the chances are excellent that most players will perform to expectations and, even if their bars are sky-high, they won't be exceeded by some massive margin.

Fair or not, the goaltending's got to do that.

So it should mean ... honestly, more than anything that both Jarry and Nedeljkovic have been, by every palpable measure, quite good in this ongoing training camp. They've shown confidence, character and, above all, they've stopped pucks. In preseason games. In scrimmages. In drills. And even with reasonable competition at either end of the age spectrum -- Magnus Hellberg the veteran and Joel Blomqvist the top prospect -- they've stood out as the clear top two.

I asked Sullivan to assess the state of his goaltending after this game.

“I think they’ve been solid," he replied. "The depth of the position is strong right now. I think Tristan’s had a solid camp. I think Ned's had a couple of solid games. Those two guys, for me, are tracking the right way. I think Hellberg's played well. Blomqvist's played really well as a rookie in camp. We feel like we’re in a pretty good spot right now with respect to that position, just from a depth standpoint. I think they’ve really done a solid job."

After a moment's pause, he'd add, "You know, none of them are satisfied. We’re gonna continue to push them to get better. That’s the nature of what we do. But certainly, as far as their effort is concerned, their attitudes, and just their engagement in the process, has been really encouraging.”

For all that's taken place to date.

____________________

Please know, I'm not intending to paint Jarry and Nedeljkovic as equals in this scenario, any more than they'll be equals on the ice. One of these two just signed a five-year, $26,875,000 extension, and the other still hasn't been formally notified he's survived the final cuts. They're not the same, even if Sullivan's on record as stating that the coaches will "manage the workload" for Jarry, maybe meaning fewer starts.

I've been tough on Jarry. I don't apologize for that. As with everyone else I cover, I'll work just as hard to analyze what goes right when stuff's good as I will to analyze what goes wrong. I'm betting I'm one of precious few people anywhere who'd suggest he's got the talent to rank among the top half-dozen goaltenders on the planet without a sliver of sarcasm.

But I do, and it's for a reason: I've covered him, at home and on the road, going head-to-head with the elite and coming out on top. He's outplayed Andrei Vasilevskiy in Tampa, Connor Hellebuyck in Winnipeg, and the list's a lot longer than that. He's stared them down in their houses and prevailed.

As Sullivan worded it earlier in camp, "We believe in Tristan."

He should. They should.

Provided he takes care of himself. Which he seems to be doing, by all accounts. Taylor Haase and I know what his injury's been. It's not chronic unless he allows it to be chronic. It's not debilitating unless he fails to maintain it. And so far, beginning this summer with Dubas' flight to Edmonton, Alberta, to meet with Jarry and his wife, Hannah, this health comment became the top priority of management as it relates to Jarry and, in turn, Jarry's commitment right back. He's been pushed, and he's done his own pushing.

Oh, he isn't interested in talking about it.

"I feel great," he'd say a few days ago, and that was as far as the subject went.

He also isn't interested in talking about last year, other than to reiterate that he wasn't himself because of the injury.

Whatever. Doesn't matter. Stop the puck. Stay on the ice. Rinse, repeat, top-six goaltender.

Which is where Nedeljkovic comes in.

He was signed out of free agency by Dubas in part because of a passionate recommendation from Mike Vellucci, the assistant coach who raised the AHL's Calder Cup in 2019 with Nedeljkovic as his goaltender. Vellucci loved Nedeljkovic's work ethic, the edge he could bring, not only to his own starts but also off the ice to create a perpetual nudge of sorts for Jarry.

“I think Ned's a guy that brings real good energy to the rink every day," Sullivan would say. "He's shown an ability to have success in this league, and we think he's very capable. I think he's a great fit for us."

“He’s shown that he's been an All-Star, that he can play that high level,” Nedeljkovic would say of Jarry. “It's going to be good. I think we'll both push each other, and I think we're going to do a good job of giving the guys in front of us a chance to win every night.”

“He’s awesome, a great person," Jarry would say of Nedeljkovic. "I think we’re really going to complement each other well, so I think it's going to be a good year.”

Far be it from one Serb to label another Serb a great person, but Nedeljkovic has made a big impression on me already, on and off the ice.

This was him before this game:

The infant son is Greyson. The wife's Emma. And that's awesome.

Whether the dad would admit it or not.

THE ESSENTIALS

• Boxscore
• Live file
• Scoreboard
• Standings
• Statistics
• Schedule

THE HIGHLIGHTS

THE THREE STARS

As selected at PPG Paints Arena:

1. Simon Edvinsson, Red Wings D
2. JT Compher, Red Wings LW
3. Xavier Ouellet, Penguins D

THE INJURIES

• Left winger Jake Guentzel (ankle surgery) skated with the non-playing group in the morning. He's been cleared for all contact and began that level of practicing Tuesday.

THE LINEUPS

Sullivan’s lines and pairings:

Rem Pitlick-Radim Zohorna-Alex Nylander
Jansen Harkins-Sam Poulin-Valtteri Puustinen
Andreas Johnsson-Joona Koppanen-Avery Hayes
Austin Wagner-Colin White-Vinnie Hinostroza

Ty Smith-Ryan Shea
Libor Hajek-Chad Ruhwedel
Xavier Ouellet-Mark Friedman

And for Derek Lalonde's Red Wings:

Alex DeBrincat-Dylan Larkin-Lucas Raymond
Robby Fabbri-JT Compher-Daniel Sprong
Cross Hanas-Marco Kasper-Austin Czarnik
Tim Gettinger-Nolan Stevens-Dominik Shine

Jake Walman-Moritz Seider
Simon Edvinsson-Jeff Petry
Eemil Viro-Antti Tuomisto

THE SCHEDULE

The Penguins will practice Thursday, 11 a.m., at the UPMC Lemieux Sports Complex in Cranberry, then travel to Buffalo for their preseason finale Friday night.

THE MULTIMEDIA

THE CONTENT

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