Penguins 'break through the wall' to take down undefeated Avalanche

It would be premature to say that the Penguins are entirely out of the woods yet after some of their early-season woes.

The Penguins' 4-0 win over the Avalanche Thursday night at PPG Paints Arena was just one game -- one that brought them to a measly 3-4 record on the season.

But, man. This game showed that this Penguins team is capable of playing like this. This Avalanche team was one of the league's best -- one of the last three undefeated teams in the league, along with Boston and Vegas, entering Thursday night. The box score will show a pair of goals from Reilly Smith along with tallies from Lars Eller and Sidney Crosby for the Penguins, right next to a big blank space in Colorado's column. And the game never quite felt as close as that might even make it seem.

This was a decisive win from the Penguins. From the structured way they were able to create offense, the stellar penalty kill against one of the league's more dangerous power plays, to Tristan Jarry's clean sheet, there wasn't much more one could have hoped to see from this game.

To borrow a Mike Sullivan-ism, the Penguins were simply playing the right way, and it's that style that led to much of their offense in this one.

"I think a lot of good defensive plays lead to offensive chances," was how Eller put it.

Smith's first goal was a result of good pressure from Rickard Rakell:

Smith's second goal -- while primarily a result of a well-played two-on-one with Evgeni Malkin -- all started with Bryan Rust's play to force a turnover in his own end:

Eller's goal was a direct result of Radim Zohorna forcing a turnover only seconds before:

Then there was Crosby's goal, a direct result of Jake Guentzel capitalizing on a Nathan MacKinnon turnover:

It wasn't just the goals that came off plays like that, the Penguins were getting quick chances off of forced turnovers and good defense all night. The best opportunity that didn't find the back of the net was undoubtedly O'Connor's second-period shot that came after he picked the pocket of Cale Makar:

"I just think it was our most complete game structure-wise," Marcus Pettersson said. "We played really solid, we were aggressive because we don't just want to back off and give them all the ice to play on. We were aggressive when we could. ... We came back, everybody worked their asses off to get back into place."

The Penguins needed Jarry to be the best version of himself coming into this game. With the news this week that Alex Nedeljkovic is on long-term injured reserve with a lower-body injury that he sustained Tuesday, the Penguins will be without Nedeljkovic until Nov. 19 at the absolute earliest. The Penguins are going to need to lean on Jarry heavily when it comes to his workload for quite some time here.

The Avalanche certainly tested Jarry. He faced 11 high-danger shots, and stopped them all. One of his brightest moments came on the penalty-kill late in the second period. His stick was snapped, but play continued for quite awhile after. Letang handed off his own stick, and so Jarry was working with a skater's stick for a good portion of the penalty kill. A stoppage finally came when Jonathan Drouin ripped a shot from the slot and Jarry gloved it down with ease:

There was also this robbery on Bowen Byram, just as another Avalanche power play was expiring in the third:

"When we did break down or Colorado made some nice plays, I thought Jars was there to make some really good saves," Sullivan said. "He made a couple of ten-bell saves on the penalty-kill. Usually when your penalty-kill is going well, your best penalty killer is your goaltender – and I thought he was that tonight for us.”

Jarry did come up big for the Penguins on the penalty-kill when tested, but he was really hardly tested at all. The Avalanche had a total of 10 minutes on the power play, and they got four shots total in that time. Four. In 10 minutes. The Penguins used 10 penalty-killers, and many of them had heavy minutes shorthanded -- Kris Letang (5:33), Eller (5:24), Ryan Graves (5:04), Pettersson (5:01), Matt Nieto (4:24), Chad Ruhwedel (4:22), Rust (3:42), Noel Acciari (3:15), Smith (2:40) and O'Connor (:34).

"I just thought they did a good job collectively as a group," Sullivan said. "That's a real good power play that we're up against. Our PK had to kill far too many for our liking, that’s for sure. It felt like we were on the kill half the second period. We’d like to take less penalties, for sure. But I thought they did a terrific job."

The Penguins' start to the season was rocky. The frustration in the locker room was evident after those losses, because the players knew that this team had the ability to be much better than what they showed then. The belief in the locker room after the early disappointments was that the Penguins would be able to work through all that was holding them back, shake it off and start winning some hard games. There's still work to be done, but this was a massive leap in the right direction.

"We didn't have our best performance in the in the last few," Smith said. "Sooner or later, you just kind of have to break through the wall."

THE ESSENTIALS

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

THE HIGHLIGHTS

THE THREE STARS

As selected at PPG Paints Arena

1. Tristan Jarry, Penguins G
2. Reilly Smith, Penguins LW
3. Lars Eller, Penguins C

THE INJURIES

• Goaltender Alex Nedeljkovic is sidelined week-to-week with a lower-body injury sustained on Tuesday. He is on long-term injured reserve and cannot return until Nov. 19 at the earliest.

• Defenseman John Ludvig is out indefinitely with a concussion sustained in his NHL debut on Tuesday. He has not placed on injured reserve, the Penguins don't need the additional roster spot that would come from IR right now.

• Defenseman Will Butcher is sidelined with an undisclosed injury sustained at the end of last season. He has resumed skating with a group in a non-contact capacity. He will be put on waivers to be sent down to Wilkes-Barre once healthy. He is on season-opening injured reserve, so his cap hit does not count.

• Forward Raivis Ansons is dealing with an upper-body injury sustained in the last month of the AHL season. He has resumed skating on his own. He will also be re-assigned to Wilkes-Barre/Scranton once healthy and is also on season-opening injured reserve.

• Defenseman Mark Pysyk is out "longer-term" with a lower-body injury. He attended Penguins training camp on a professional tryout contract, and was released from the PTO on Oct. 9 along with the other unsigned PTOs. But Pysyk has been around the team since the start of the season, has a stall in the locker room, and has resumed skating on his own with the Penguins' skating coaches. He doesn't have a contract with the Penguins, but it sure looks like they have some kind of plan for him once he's healthy. Thursday's morning skate was his first "structured" skate," as Sullivan put it.

THE LINEUPS

Sullivan’s lines and pairings:

Jake Guentzel - Sidney Crosby - Bryan Rust
Reilly Smith - Evgeni Malkin - Rickard Rakell
Drew O'Connor - Lars Eller - Radim Zohorna
Matt Nieto - Noel Acciari - Jeff Carter

Ryan Graves - Kris Letang
Marcus Pettersson - Erik Karlsson
Ryan Shea - Chad Ruhwedel

And for Jared Bednar's Avalanche

Artturi Lehkonen - Nathan MacKinnon - Valeri Nichuskin
Tomas Tatar - Ryan Johansen - Mikko Rantanen
Miles Wood - Ross Colton - Jonathan Drouin
Andrew Cogliano - Fredrik Olofsson - Logan O'Connor

Devon Toews - Cale Makar
Bowen Byram - Samuel Girard
Jack Johnson - Josh Manson

THE MULTIMEDIA THE SCHEDULE

The Penguins were scheduled to practice on Friday but canceled it in favor of an off-ice workout. Next game is Saturday at home against the Senators.

THE CONTENT

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