Mark Madden: Dominoes have started falling in the Penguins' rebuild, but questions remain

The Pittsburgh Penguins’ 7-1 home loss to the Dallas Stars on Monday was a white flag of sorts.

Trading center Lars Eller to Washington the next day was confirmation thereof.

The Penguins can’t compete with top-tier teams, not least because they ill-advisedly attempt to beat them at their own game but with lesser amounts of speed and skill. The result is several lopsided defeats, the latest being that debacle vs. Dallas that saw the Penguins trail 6-0 after one period.

That rout may have finally triggered open rebuilding, as per the Eller trade.

Eller was probably the Penguins’ seventh-best forward, and president of hockey ops/GM Kyle Dubas sent him to a Metropolitan Division rival that is directly competing with the Penguins for a playoff spot.

The Penguins got third- and fifth-round picks, with the better pick coming in 2027. Help procured won’t exactly be immediate.

That’s OK. These Penguins aren’t a playoff team. The rot has set in.

This trade constitutes open acknowledgement.

So did trading Jake Guentzel at last season’s trade deadline. But we just didn’t want to see it.

How will the Penguins’ dressing room react to Eller’s departure?

Group therapy and/or Prozac seemed needed before and after Guentzel left as the Penguins went 1-7 on either side of that trade, their mourning effectively costing them a postseason berth.

But Eller isn’t Guentzel, and there’s no denying the sorry state of these Penguins. It’s not like they traded Ron Francis in his prime.

What happens next?

Marcus Pettersson and Rickard Rakell should keep the numbers of their real-estate agents handy.

Perhaps more young players will crack the lineup.

On Monday, forward Sam Poulin was a healthy scratch. He had just been summoned from the Penguins’ Wilkes-Barre/Scranton farm team. He was the Penguins’ first-round pick in 2019.

Poulin, 23, has been a bust till now, his career stalling amid mental health issues.

But Poulin got off to a decent start this season with the Baby Penguins, notching three goals and six assists in 11 games. He got called up when veteran Kevin Hayes went on injured reserve.

Then Poulin got scratched.

He drove across the state, practiced with the Penguins and got scratched.

That makes zero sense.

Poulin probably won’t ever turn out to be a major contributor in the NHL. But there’s only one way to find out. And the only way to get younger is to actually play younger players.

Trading Eller removes one obstacle to that.

Vasily Ponomarev, 22, came to the Penguins from Carolina as part of the Guentzel deal. He was injured during the preseason and is currently at Wilkes-Barre/Scranton. He’s projected as a third-line center at the NHL level.

With Eller gone, perhaps Ponomarev can be that.

Or maybe the Penguins will have him drive across the state, then scratch him. He and Poulin can carpool.

If rebuilding is truly underway, everyone involved needs to be on the same page: GM, coach, captain, locker room, everybody. The days of eking by with recycled veterans should be over.

If younger players are ready, use them. Mine that energy. If that puts somebody like Blake Lizotte in the press box or on waivers, so be it. If a level of discomfort is created, good. That can spawn improvement.

It’s going to be a slow process. Plenty of untradable contracts, and that third-round pick in 2027 won’t be arriving in Pittsburgh anytime soon.

Lots of tough questions must be asked and answered. Those dominoes appear set to start falling.

The Penguins now have 29 picks in the next three drafts, 14 in rounds 1-3. That’s good. Go get more.