Another long summer awaits Penguins
In the late days of last summer, Evgeni Malkin expressed aspirations for the Pittsburgh Penguins that weren’t all that complex.
He wanted to play meaningful games in the spring.
“We don’t want a long summer again,” Malkin said during the opening stages of training camp Sept. 19. “We want to play in the playoffs. Any team can win in the playoffs, the Stanley Cup.”
Unfortunately for Malkin and his teammates, summer — for their intents and purposes — began Thursday night, marking the third consecutive year the Penguins have missed the postseason.
This time is a bit different, however, as expectations of the Penguins — externally, at least — were minimal entering 2024-25.
Having been largely aggressive in augmenting the roster during the previous 19 offseasons, the Penguins were frugal shoppers during the summer of 2024, prioritizing future assets over entities that could help the team in the immediate sense.
To wit: When they swung a trade June 29 with the St. Louis Blues, adding the guile of aging veteran Kevin Hayes wasn’t their primary attraction.
The second-round draft pick they also received in that transaction was.
With castoffs such as Hayes, forwards Anthony Beauvillier, Cody Glass and Blake Lizotte as well as defenseman Matt Grzelcyk joining an already limited roster of incumbents, the Penguins looked exactly like a team that needed a lot of bounces to go their way to pose a threat for a playoff spot.
In contrast, not much had to go wrong for them to miss the postseason again.
As it turned out, a lot went wrong in 2024-25.
First and foremost, their goaltending was seemingly catawampus all season long, aside from a late-season stabilization.
Tristan Jarry entered the season with plenty of scrutiny given his previous shortcomings. And he did nothing to dissipate the concerns over his reliability almost from the start of the campaign.
In the season opener, a deflating 6-0 home loss to the New York Rangers on Oct. 9, Jarry allowed a goal on the first shot he faced. That first-shot, first-goal habit happened 15 times this season for the Penguins, including on eight occasions for Jarry.
Jarry’s malfunctions were so dire, he wound up being assigned to Wilkes-Barre/Scranton of the American Hockey League twice over the course of the season, the second coming after he cleared waivers in January.
But when the combination of Alex Nedeljkovic and rookie Joel Blomqvist was perforated like a train ticket, the team turned back to Jarry after the trade deadline in March and he offered the most stable stretch of goaltending the team enjoyed all season long.
Appearing in 13 of the team’s final 16 games, Jarry had an 8-4-2 record, a 2.81 goals-against average, a .904 save percentage and two shutouts.
Solid figures to be sure, but not sufficient enough to overlook his previous lapses, dating as far back as to when the Penguins were still a playoff team.
Jarry’s contract has three years remaining and carries a salary cap hit of $5.375 million. Finding a trade partner willing to take on Jarry is easier said than done, and a buyout would carry ramifications for up to six seasons.
The Penguins do have internal options to use. Blomqvist still has plenty of potential despite lackluster numbers at the NHL level this season. And fellow prospect Sergei Murashov has been nothing but spectacular in his first season of North American hockey.
Of course, no matter who is in net, it would be helpful if the defense — top-heavy with expensive blue liners who have fallen short of expectations commensurate with their salary cap hits — did not serve as turnstiles against opponents.
Erik Karlsson and Kris Letang are still very capable of doing some wonderful things. But the propensity for wonderful things happening in favor of the opposition when the two right-handers are on the ice seemed to be amplified this season.
In Letang’s case, his health was a considerable impediment. He missed eight games because of various ailments. Most notably, he missed Thursday’s season finale after undergoing surgery to repair a hole in his heart that played a role in a pair of strokes he suffered earlier in his career.
By all accounts, Letang has every intention of continuing his obsessive workout regimen this summer and returning for his 20th NHL season. He’ll need to if he hopes to still log more than 23 minutes a game in every situation.
As for Karlsson, the 34-year-old still consistently offers the form of an offensively aggressive defenseman who treats the first seven letters in the name of his position as if they were optional. That isn’t likely to change in whatever time he has remaining as an NHLer.
Both players have multiple years remaining on their contracts. Given Letang’s stature within the organization, it’s hard to imagine him moving anywhere anytime soon. The same can’t be said for Karlsson. Even if they would have to retain some of his salary cap hit, it might be prudent for the Penguins to investigate every potential avenue for jettisoning Karlsson.
Ditto Ryan Graves.
Primarily expected to automatically slot in as a replacement for defensive stalwart Brian Dumoulin as a free agent signing in 2024, it just has not happened for Graves, who has four years remaining on a contract with a salary cap hit of $4.5 million.
After floundering on the team’s top two pairings during the 2023-24 season, Graves was largely deployed on the third duo throughout 2024-25. His impact — both positively and negatively — was largely sheltered in that capacity.
Regardless, he simply has not met even the base level of expectations as a member of the Penguins.
Elsewhere on the blue line, Grzelcyk had a subtly effective bounce-back season to reestablish himself as a dependable NHLer. A pending unrestricted free agent, Grzelcyk could easily return, but considering his success — he set a career high with 40 points (one goal, 39 assists) while helping the power-play make considerable improvement — a more lucrative and longer contract could be acquired elsewhere.
Ryan Shea and Conor Timmins seem to have a role as bottom-pair options. Partly because of injury, P.O Joseph didn’t offer much in his return to the Penguins. Vladislav Kolyachonok had a difficult time cracking a bad lineup and was a regular healthy scratch.
Rookie Owen Pickering showed off some of his immense potential midway through the season before returning to Wilkes-Barre/Scranton to play quality minutes. He figures to be a candidate for a permanent promotion to the NHL roster next season.
Up front, things are a bit more settled, especially with the likes of Sidney Crosby, Rickard Rakell and Bryan Rust playing like legitimate first-liners.
The other three lines are another matter.
Malkin, the team’s oldest player at 38, was largely saddled with lesser wingers in the form of Philip Tomasino and Michael Bunting — now a member of the Nashville Predators — for most of the season.
If the Penguins are serious about getting something significant out of a diminished but still dangerous Malkin in the final year of his current contract, an upgrade in terms of linemates would facilitate that endeavor.
Rookies Ville Koivunen and Rutger McGroarty could serve that purpose. They were impressive during late-season recalls. But a quick burst of games with the adrenaline of a recall is different than grinding through an entire 82 games. Presumably, both prospects will get a chance to do that entering next season.
One player who figures to offer more next season is Tommy Novak, who was limited to two games with the Penguins because of an undisclosed injury he suffered shortly after he was acquired by trade March 5.
The Penguins have a strong history of utilizing effective No. 3 centers behind Crosby and Malkin. Management has legitimate hopes of Novak continuing that lineage.
Further down the line, the likes of Tomasino and Connor Dewar — each pending restricted free agents — offered evidence they can be contributors in supporting capacities.
Veterans such as Noel Acciari, Danton Heinen, Hayes and Lizotte are under contract for another year and are limited in what they can provide.
Prospects like Vasily Ponomarev and Sam Poulin offer something to consider in bottom-six roles.
Summer has started for the Penguins. It will be a long one again.
And several of the franchise’s key components are in the autumns of their dazzling NHL careers, especially Malkin, who turns 39 in July and has one year remaining on his contract.
Is there still time for this group — led by Malkin, Crosby and Letang — to enjoy another short summer?
“It is on the back your mind that these guys who have been here — and they carry the torch — that time is undefeated,” Rust said during season-ending interviews Friday. “I think all good things come to come to an end. But don’t think we’re quite there yet.
“We’ve got time, and obviously we want to make the most of it, especially with these franchise guys who have been here for so long.”
Seth Rorabaugh is a TribLive reporter covering the Pittsburgh Penguins. A North Huntingdon native, he joined the Trib in 2019 and has covered the Penguins since 2007. He can be reached at srorabaugh@triblive.com.
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