Penguins forward Philip Tomasino keeps scoring while developing his overall game

Philip Tomasino generally doesn’t want to talk about what happened in Nashville.

And what did not happen at all during his first 11 games of the 2024-25 season as a member of the Predators was a goal. He had a zero in that column while wearing that team’s uniform.

But after the Pittsburgh Penguins acquired the winger via trade Nov. 25, he has proceeded to pump in 10 goals in his 40 games with his current employer.

And they have been significant goals, too. Along with forward Sidney Crosby, Tomasino shares the team lead with six winning scores.

His most recent such goal occurred in a 7-3 home win against the New Jersey Devils on Sunday. Taking possession of a puck following a blunder of a turnover by Devils defenseman Johnathan Kovacevic, Tomasino ripped a wrister by goaltender Jacob Markstrom’s glove.

Pittsburgh goal!

Scored by Philip Tomasino with 17:38 remaining in the 3rd period.

Pittsburgh: 4
New Jersey: 1#NJDvsPIT #LetsGoPens #NJDevils pic.twitter.com/LlHflWp5Xi

— NHL Goals (@nhl_goal_bot) March 15, 2025

“It’s nice,” Tomasino said of the winning-goal figure. “Obviously, it feels good to score some big goals for our group here. But as long as we’re winning, that’s all that matters.”

One matter of Tomasino’s play that could use some sprucing up is his defensive game.

“It’s a work in progress,” coach Mike Sullivan said. “His intentions, on most nights, are in the right place, but there’s a lot of opportunity for growth. Everything from being harder on pucks to winning wall battles to positional play, stopping and starting in the defensive zone, there’s lots of details around it. But I think he’s trying to play the right way. We’ve tried to be clear to him what those expectations are with his play away from the puck, and we’re trying to hold him accountable to those.

“Everybody recognizes his talent. He’s a talented guy. He has pretty good offensive instincts, he can make a play and he can score. But in order to make the impact that we think he’s capable of, we’re going to challenge him to continue to grow and develop his complete game.”

Those deficiencies were part of the reason the Predators opted to move on from Tomasino, a first-round draft pick (No. 24 overall) in 2019.

Tomasino acknowledged those faults but suggested he has refined them since joining the Penguins.

“My game is at a good stage right now,” Tomasino said. “I think there’s still more. I’m trying to work on different aspects of my game every day. But if you look at my game from when I first got here until now, just the way it’s evolved — in terms of my complete game — I think I’m doing a lot of things better. I’ve definitely improved in a lot of those aspects.”

With the Penguins largely rebuilding — or whatever word with the prefix of “re” is appropriate — this season, Tomasino (the youngest player on the NHL roster at 23 years and 232 days) has been able to refine his game in real time while largely manning the right wing next to All-Star center Evgeni Malkin (the team’s oldest member at 38 years and 229 days).

According to Natural Stat Trick, Tomasino has logged 205 minutes, 48 seconds of common five-on-five ice time with Malkin, his most with any linemate this season.

“He’s an incredible player,” Tomasino said. “He’s one of the best players of all time. Just for me to get a chance to play with him, he’s so skilled. We’ve jelled well, especially recently. He’s making plays. There’s still more for our line to generate more in (the offensive) zone. Just giving him the puck and getting open. But I thought as the (season) had gone on, we’ve been generating a lot more and holding onto more pucks. And not giving up as many odd-man rushes against. Just our overall game has been a lot better.

“He’s obviously been a guy that I’ve looked up to my whole life. To get a chance to play with him is incredible.”

Whatever the Penguins are going to be in the 2025-26 season as a competitive entity, Tomasino figures to be part of it. He is a pending restricted free agent, and it doesn’t seem like he will be all that difficult to re-sign coming off a contract with a tidy salary cap hit of $825,000.

“You could see when he came into this room, his confidence probably wasn’t where he’d like it,” Penguins forward Bryan Rust said. “As a young player, that can be hard. But I think the guys in here, (coaching) staff especially, have done a really good job of trying to help build that confidence and try to help him play a game that makes him successful. Not try to change him too much. Obviously, he is who he is, and he got to the NHL for a reason. But just build on his foundation and establish a few more details in his game. Then you can see offensively with the puck — especially this last few weeks here — you can see he’s a lot more confident now. He’s making plays, he producing offense, he’s playing really well for us.

“The more he can continue to do that throughout the rest of this year and into next year, he’s going to be a really big player for us.”

Tomasino’s future certainly looks much brighter than his past.

“Overall, it’s been really good,” Tomasino said of joining the Penguins. “Probably been the best thing to happen to me in my career so far.”

Note: Injured Penguins defensemen P.O Joseph (undisclosed) and Ryan Shea (suspected left hand or wrist) skated before practice in Cranberry on Monday.