Penguins see 5-game winning streak snapped in loss to Devils

Having spent the previous two seasons in the employ of the New Jersey Devils, Pittsburgh Penguins defenseman Ryan Graves had some obvious emotions of playing his former team for the first time since departing the Garden State as an unrestricted free agent this past offseason.

“It’s not uncommon to have friends on other teams,” Graves said Wednesday in Cranberry. “But it’s usually just one guy, not 15 of them. So it’s definitely weird, but at the same time, it’s a little bit more fun to compete against them. You definitely don’t want them to get the better of you.”

On Thursday at PPG Paints Arena, the Penguins were not the better team against the Devils, falling 5-2. The result halted the Penguins’ season-best five-game winning streak and extended a sequence of futility against the Devils to a half-dozen games dating to the 2021-22 season.

Thursday’s setback was particularly repugnant considering the Devils dressed an irregular lineup of 11 forwards and seven defensemen due in part to injuries that have sidelined top-six forwards Nico Hischier, Jack Hughes and Timo Meier.

This is the Penguins’ longest active losing streak against any one opponent.

“I don’t know,” Penguins forward Sidney Crosby said when asked if there was a common theme in their futility with the Devils. “They’re opportunistic. You turn the puck over in the neutral zone, (and) they’ve got some speedy guys. … I don’t remember the storylines from the (games) before, but I think (they have) team speed and they defend pretty well.

“You’ve got to be good in every area to beat them.”

The Penguins did not reach that standard.

“Really in any area, we weren’t really good to be honest with you,” Crosby said bluntly. “We didn’t execute well. We had a couple of leads and then they got it back right away. They were a desperate team. They played better. They outworked us. Some nights, you’re not going to have your best.

“But, I thought we beat ourselves a bit.”

The Penguins beat the Devils to the first lead of the contest 6:36 into regulation via forward Bryan Rust’s eighth goal of the season.

Settling a loose puck in his own zone, Penguins forward Jake Guentzel identified a slapdash line change by the Devils and slung a cross-ice stretch pass from above his own right circle to the far boards, providing Rust unfettered entry into the offensive zone. Upon arrival at the crease, Rust flipped the puck to his backhand and elevated a shot over goaltender Vitek Vanecek’s blocker. Guentzel had the only assist.

A short-handed goal tied the game 1-1 at 13:34 of the first period.

After a neutral zone turnover by Rust, Devils forward Erik Haula generated a two-on-one rush with forward Curtis Lazar against Penguins defenseman Kris Letang. After gaining the offensive blue line at the center point, Haula offloaded the puck to Lazar on the right wing. As Letang leaned down to provide passive resistance, Lazar fired a wrister from below the dot through goaltender Tristan Jarry’s five hole. Haula logged the lone assist. That was the third short-handed goal the Penguins had allowed this season.

“It definitely didn’t help, that’s for sure,” Rust said. “I have to make a better play than that.”

Much like iron oxidation, Rust was persistent and scored his second goal of the contest 3:17 into the second frame. Taking a pass in the high slot of the offensive zone, Penguins defenseman Erik Karlsson sashayed his way to the left circle. Fending off a backcheck from Devils forward Michael McLeod, Karlsson slid the puck on his backhand toward a cluster of bodies amassed at the crease. The puck went through Guentzel’s skates and then was jabbed by a forehand shot from Rust into the cage under Vanecek’s left leg. Karlsson and Crosby collected assists. Crosby extended a scoring streak to 10 games.

The Devils responded only 38 seconds later via forward Nathan Bastian’s first goal.

After Penguins linemates Noel Acciari and Matt Nieto failed to connect on a cross-ice stretch pass between the blue lines, Devils forward Dougie Hamilton stole the puck and fed it to forward Tomas Nosek, who gained the offensive zone on the right wing. Taking a drop pass from Nosek at the right point, Hamilton lifted a pedestrian wrister from the near half wall. Jarry made a save but allowed a clunky rebound. Haula barged past Karlsson for the rebound and was rejected by Jarry. The puck slid to the left of the crease, where Bastian cleaned it up with a wrister that banked off Jarry’s right skate blade and into the cage.

Forward Jesper Bratt’s eighth goal of the season gave his team its first lead during a four-on-four sequence at 2:35 of the third period.

Navigating his way through the neutral zone around a check attempt by Guentzel, Devils rookie defenseman Luke Hughes gained the offensive blue line on the right wing and then fed a forehand pass to the high slot for Bratt. Pulling away from a stick check by Penguins forward Lars Eller, Bratt veered to the left circle and scorched Jarry’s right shoulder with a near-side wrister. Hughes and Lazar tallied assists.

The Devils delivered the coup de grace later in the third with goals by forwards Alexander Holtz (his fourth at the 11:24 mark) and Tyler Toffoli (his ninth 20 seconds later).

Holtz struck first off some precision passing.

After a turnover by Letang at the right point of the offensive zone, Devils forward Ondrej Palat drove the puck up ice and gained the Penguins’ blue line on the left wing. Pulling up on the half wall, Palat drew in Eller and defenseman Marcus Pettersson then rimmed the puck to the end boards for linemate Dawson Mercer. Penguins forward Radim Zohorna vacated the left side of the cage to pursue, which allowed Mercer to slip a pass to Holtz, who swiped a one-timer on the near side by the blocker of an unsuspecting Jarry. Assists went to Mercer and Palat.

Turnovers by the Penguins, particularly in or near the neutral zone, were a common theme with the Devils’ offense.

“A lot of them were just not executing a tape-to-tape pass,” Penguins coach Mike Sullivan said. “We had opportunities to make tape-to-tape passes. I thought we had a bunch of looks in the first period. We had a couple of (three-on-one, two-on-one rushes), a breakaway. We had a bunch of looks. We just didn’t execute. I don’t think we were sharp in any aspect of the game.

“Some of those turnovers … we had opportunities to go tape to tape to make a pass and we missed it for whatever reason.”

The Devils’ passing was sound on Toffoli’s score.

From his own right half wall, Hughes airmailed the puck to the neutral zone, where Bratt gloved it down in front of the home penalty box and gained entry into the offensive zone on the left wing. With Penguins defenseman Ryan Shea defending a two-on-one sequence essentially, Bratt centered the puck to Toffoli, who ripped a wrister from the right hashmarks by Jarry’s scorched blocker on the far side. Bratt and Hughes had assists.

Jarry was diced up, as his record was leveled to 6-6-0 after he made 26 saves on 31 shots.

Sullivan provided a stiffer defense for Jarry than most of his teammates offered during the contest.

“He’s been pretty solid,” Sullivan said. “I don’t know that we can look at Tristan at this one. I don’t think we were very good in front of him. It was a collective effort on that front. I just don’t think we were good enough as a group.”

The Penguins haven’t been good enough against the Devils for nearly two years.

Their last win against the Devils was a 4-2 road victory on Feb. 13, 2022.

Jarry got the win that day.

“Every game is different in different ways,” Jarry said. “Obviously, we have to figure out a way to beat these guys. Losing six straight to them is not good enough. We’ll learn from it, and we’ll be a better team from it.”

Notes:

• Penguins forward Jeff Carter and defenseman P.O Joseph were healthy scratches.

• The Penguins’ second-longest losing streaks against individual teams are four-game skids against the Carolina Hurricanes, Edmonton Oilers and New York Islanders.