Jonathan Bombulie stories, Page 12
Penguins Predictions: Can Jake Guentzel reach 40-goal mark again?
Last year at this time, Pittsburgh Penguins winger Jake Guentzel had a very clear goal in mind. He was fresh off a red-hot playoff performance that saw him score 10 goals in 12 games. On the heels of a 13-goal output in the playoffs the year before that, Guentzel was...
Penguins of the Decade: No. 3, Kris Letang
Beat writer Jonathan Bombulie has compiled a countdown of the top Pittsburgh Penguins of the 2010s. At No. 3 is defenseman Kris Letang. Follow the Pittsburgh Penguins all season long....
Penguins Predictions: Which call-up will play the most NHL games?
It was repeated often enough to become a motto of sorts: The goal for the Pittsburgh Penguins as they reshaped their roster this summer was to become younger, faster and harder to play against. One of the reasons the Penguins needed to get younger was that they didn’t do a...
Penguins of the Decade: No. 4, Matt Murray
Beat writer Jonathan Bombulie has compiled a countdown of the top Pittsburgh Penguins of the 2010s. At No. 4 is goalie Matt Murray. Follow the Pittsburgh Penguins all season long....
Penguins Predictions: Will Kris Letang remain among game’s elite defensemen?
The last time the Pittsburgh Penguins gathered in their locker room at the UPMC Lemieux Sports Complex in Cranberry, defenseman Kris Letang supplied the fireworks. In the wake of a couple of high-profile mistakes that cost his team goals in a first-round playoff loss to the New York Islanders a...
Penguins of the Decade: No. 5, Marc-Andre Fleury
Beat writer Jonathan Bombulie has compiled a countdown of the top Pittsburgh Penguins of the 2010s. At No. 5 is goalie Marc-Andre Fleury. Follow the Pittsburgh Penguins all season long....
Penguins Predictions: Will Brian Dumoulin step into the spotlight?
Sidney Crosby had 100 points. Jake Guentzel scored 40 goals. Kris Letang gave a strong bounceback performance. Those are loud. Know who had a quietly excellent season for the Pittsburgh Penguins last year? Defenseman Brian Dumoulin. When Dumoulin was on the ice at even strength, the Penguins outscored their opponents,...
Penguins of the Decade: No. 6, Phil Kessel
Beat writer Jonathan Bombulie has compiled a countdown of the top Pittsburgh Penguins of the 2010s. At No. 6 is forward Phil Kessel. Follow the Pittsburgh Penguins all season long....
Penguins Predictions: Where will team stand at Thanksgiving?
After a particularly brutal 6-4 loss in Ottawa last Nov. 17, Pittsburgh Penguins center Matt Cullen made an astute observation. “We need to have more urgency in our game,” Cullen said. “Time goes pretty quick here. We’ll find ourselves at Thanksgiving here soon.” The wise old centerman knew that spot...
Penguins of the Decade: No. 7, Chris Kunitz
Beat writer Jonathan Bombulie has compiled a countdown of the top Pittsburgh Penguins of the 2010s. At No. 7 is forward Chris Kunitz. Follow the Pittsburgh Penguins all season long....
Penguins Predictions: Will Patric Hornqvist rediscover his power-play prowess?
Last year, Pittsburgh Penguins winger Patric Hornqvist had a good first half and a terrible second half of the season. That cannot be debated. He had 15 goals in 34 games when a puck to the face gave him the fourth documented concussion of his career Jan. 8. He had...
Penguins of the Decade: No. 8, Patric HornqvistVideo
Beat writer Jonathan Bombulie has compiled a countdown of the top Pittsburgh Penguins of the 2010s. At No. 8 is forward Patric Hornqvist. Follow the Pittsburgh Penguins all season long....
Penguins Predictions: Who will take Phil Kessel’s spot on the power play?
To suggest Pittsburgh Penguins coach Mike Sullivan had a love-hate relationship with his top power-play unit last season is no exaggeration. Sullivan had genuine, intense respect and admiration for the amazing offensive feats players such as Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and Kris Letang are capable of. “When they’re on, they’re...
Penguins of the Decade: No. 9, Jake GuentzelVideo
Beat writer Jonathan Bombulie has compiled a countdown of the top Pittsburgh Penguins of the 2010s. At No. 9 is forward Jake Guentzel. Follow the Pittsburgh Penguins all season long....
Penguins Predictions: Will Matt Murray break the bank with his next contract?
The Pittsburgh Penguins have had their fair share of trouble fitting under the salary cap the last few seasons. None of those woes can be pinned on the team’s goaltenders. Starter Matt Murray makes $3.75 million per season. Backup Casey DeSmith’s salary is $1.25 million. Add them up and that’s...
Penguins of the Decade: No. 10, Pascal Dupuis
Beat writer Jonathan Bombulie has compiled a countdown of the top Pittsburgh Penguins of the 2010s. At No. 10 is forward Pascal Dupuis. Follow the Pittsburgh Penguins all season long....
Penguins Predictions: Who will lead team in penalty minutes?
When Pittsburgh Penguins star Evgeni Malkin exchanged punches with Tampa Bay’s Steven Stamkos during a January game last season, teammate Kris Letang looked on with a combination of amusement and concern. “Geno is always good for one fight a year. I guess that was it,” Letang said after the game....
Penguins of the Decade: No. 11, Brian Dumoulin
Beat writer Jonathan Bombulie has compiled a countdown of the top Pittsburgh Penguins players of the 2010s. At No. 11 is defenseman Brian Dumoulin. Follow the Pittsburgh Penguins all season long....
Penguins Predictions: How long will Justin Schultz stay in black and gold?
After playing without Justin Schultz for four months after he broke his leg in the fourth game of the season, the Pittsburgh Penguins should have a pretty good idea by now of how integral the 29-year-old offensive defenseman is to their success. Results, though, are inconclusive. On paper, he looks...
Penguins of the Decade: No. 12, James Neal
Beat writer Jonathan Bombulie has compiled a countdown of the top 15 Pittsburgh Penguins of the 2010s. At No. 12 is forward James Neal. Follow the Pittsburgh Penguins all season long....
Penguins Predictions: What is Alex Galchenyuk’s upside?
This isn’t the kind of thing a general manager would trumpet about the marquee piece he just acquired in a deal for a three-time all-star winger, but it’s something Jim Rutherford easily could have said when he picked up Alex Galchenyuk in the Phil Kessel deal in June. Galchenyuk is...
Penguins of the Decade: No. 13, Olli MaattaVideo
Beat writer Jonathan Bombulie has compiled a countdown of the top 15 Pittsburgh Penguins of the 2010s. At No. 13 is defenseman Olli Maatta. Follow the Pittsburgh Penguins all season long....
Penguins Predictions: Can Dominik Simon ramp up his production?
Assessing the game of 25-year-old Pittsburgh Penguins winger Dominik Simon is as simple as can be. There’s one big plus: The Penguins score goals more frequently when he’s on the ice than when he’s not. There’s one big minus: He’s almost never the one actually putting the puck in the...
Penguins of the Decade: No. 14, Bryan RustVideo
Beat writer Jonathan Bombulie has compiled a countdown of the top 15 Pittsburgh Penguins players of the 2010s. At No. 14 is Bryan Rust. Follow the Pittsburgh Penguins all season long....
Penguins Predictions: Will Evgeni Malkin bounce back from subpar season?
In the weeks immediately following a humiliating first-round playoff ouster, Pittsburgh Penguins star Evgeni Malkin took a tremendous amount of heat. Perhaps the intensity of the flames — the ones that suggested he could be traded as Penguins management mulled how dramatically it would alter the team’s roster — was...
