Penguins A to Z: Ryan Shea is a reliable option as a reserve defenseman

With the Pittsburgh Penguins entering the offseason for a third consecutive year without a playoff appearance, TribLive will offer Penguins A to Z, a player-by-player look at all 58 individuals signed to an NHL contract – including those whose deals do not begin until future seasons — with the organization.

Starting with Noel Acciari and going on through to Philip Tomasino (regrettably, there is no Z on the payroll), every player will be profiled in alphabetical order.

This series is scheduled to be published Mondays through Saturdays leading up until June 26, a day before the start of the NHL Draft. In the event of a transaction, that schedule will be altered as necessary.

(Note: All contract information courtesy of Puckpedia.)

Ryan Shea

Position: Defenseman

Shoots: Left

Age: 28

Height: 6-foot-1

Weight: 220 pounds

2024-25 NHL statistics: 39 games, five points (two goals, three assists), 16:44 of average ice time per contest

Contract: Signed to a one-year contract with a salary cap hit of $775,000. Entering a one-year contract with a salary cap hit of $900,000. Pending unrestricted free agent in 2026.

Acquired: Unrestricted free agent signing, July 1, 2023

This past season: For the most part, the Penguins’ blue line was not a strength throughout the 2024-25 campaign.

And those unappetizing results are largely due to the shortcomings of the defensemen with the biggest salary cap hits on the team, Erik Karlsson ($10 million), Kris Letang ($6.1 million) and Ryan Graves ($4.5 million).

Ryan Shea didn’t have a major impact on the group. He’s not that important to the overall fortunes of the club, frankly. But that doesn’t mean his individual season wasn’t a success.

Simply staying on the NHL roster for an entire season for the first time in his career qualified as success.

A healthy scratch for 14 of the team’s first 17 games, Shea got into the lineup on a regular basis in mid-November.

Primarily stationed on the third pairing, Shea, was a fairly steady presence in the lineup through December before being a healthy scratch again for 17 of 19 contests to open January.

The high point of the season for Shea — and perhaps his NHL existence — came when he rejoined the lineup Feb. 23 and scored a career-best two goals during a 5-3 home loss to the New York Rangers.

Pittsburgh goal!

Scored by Ryan Shea with 19:03 remaining in the 3rd period.

Assisted by Evgeni Malkin and Erik Karlsson.

Pittsburgh: 2
New York: 2#NYRvsPIT #LetsGoPens #NYR pic.twitter.com/uKEL9B6vaO

— NHL Goals (@nhl_goal_bot) February 23, 2025

By March 3, Shea was promoted to the left side of the top pairing next to the right-handed Letang and largely afforded himself well in that demanding assignment. During that stretch, he signed a one-year contract extension for the 2025-26 season on March 7.

A broken finger on his left hand suffered March 9 stunted that momentum, however, and Shea wound up missing seven games due to that ailment.

Back in the lineup by March 27, Shea played in the team’s final nine games of the season.

The future: During his season-ending media availability April 21, Penguins president of hockey operations Kyle Dubas bemoaned the state of the left side of the team’s blue line and suggested it would be an area of focus over the offseason.

Shea figures to be part of the solution to that issue going into 2025-26, even if just as a reserve. That said, he is a viable swing option considering he wound up starting more games on the right side (27) than the left side (12) throughout this past season.

Either way, Shea won’t ever make that large of an impact on the Penguins’ blue line. But given his versatility and generally low-risk style of play, he has become a more-than-reliable option as the Penguins’ steady seventh defenseman.