Penguins' response to blown lead personifies changing view of Tristan Jarry's improved play

It used to be that a result like Tuesday’s would be the type that would get a Penguins goalie skewered in Pittsburgh.

Particularly Tristan Jarry.

Even if he had little to do with the collapse.

The Penguins blew a 2-0 lead in the third period to the New York Islanders and lost 4-2. Kyle Palmieri scored on a breakaway in the early moments of the third after a misplay by Kris Letang off a bad bounce in the offensive zone.

21st goal for 2️⃣1️⃣!#Isles | @ford pic.twitter.com/NbUPQYGHAS

— New York Islanders (@NYIslanders) March 19, 2025

Noah Dobson scored off an initial save following an odd-man rush by the Isles that pushed the Pens back the length of the ice and into Jarry’s kitchen.

DOBSON! ????#Isles | @ford pic.twitter.com/NH6BhCyQ5v

— New York Islanders (@NYIslanders) March 19, 2025

Then Pierre Engvall got the game-winner when he leaked ahead in transition, beating Erik Karlsson and Ryan Graves down the rink.

Pierre Engvall protects the puck from the pressure and finds twine, giving the Islanders the late lead!#Isles pic.twitter.com/4QsE0hdI8T

— Hockey Daily 365 l NHL Highlights & News (@HockeyDaily365) March 19, 2025

Jarry made 34 saves. And it’s not like any of the goals were glaringly his fault. But back before the Penguins fell out of playoff contention, this was one of those classic late-game collapses when a lot of people would’ve looked at the guy in the crease and said, “Well, there’s no rule against making a save you’re not supposed to make” or “Saves are great until you let in the one that costs you game.”

Or some other dimestore pearls of goaltending logic.

The fourth goal was an empty netter. A few months ago, we would’ve found a way to blame Jarry for that too.

But since Jarry has been thrust back into service upon his recall from the AHL, it feels like our collective expectation level has changed when evaluating his performance. He’s been much better, but the team hasn’t been. So, maybe, let’s give the goalie a break on this one.

That’s certainly the stance head coach Mike Sullivan took after the game.

“Solid,” Sullivan said of the goaltending. “I thought (Jarry) was terrific all night long.”

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Actually, Jarry has been terrific ever since he returned to Pittsburgh five games ago. In that stretch, the Pens won four times, and he posted a .928 save percentage and a 2.40 goals-against average.

“He’s been huge for us over this last little stretch here and we let him down in the third,” winger Bryan Rust said. “He was able to keep us in the game. It (stinks) that we didn’t have a better outcome for him.”

Instead of fixating on how those Islander pucks got past the goalie, Sullivan preferred to focus his frustration on how the shots got on goal in the first place.

“We weren’t committed to play the game the right way,” Sullivan said of his team’s third period. “You give them a 2-on-0 on the first goal. They got a 4-on-2 on one of the other goals. It’s just easy offense. It’s hard to win that way.”

Sullivan and his players also bemoaned a lack of emotional and physical response once the Islanders started to tilt momentum in their favor to start the third period.

“We beat ourselves,” captain Sidney Crosby said. “We made some mistakes. It’s 2-0 (after the second intermission), obviously, they are going to push. But there just wasn’t a lot of pushback.”

Jarry simply credited the Islanders’ persistence throughout the game.

“They were putting a lot of pucks on net. They were putting a lot of traffic at the net,” Jarry said. “It’s hard to defend when they are going to the net like that. Maybe it caught us on our heels, and we need to be better than that.”

In the past with Jarry, it would’ve been very easy to take that quote and say, “Maybe the goalie should’ve been better in the third period, as well.”

Perhaps. Yeah. At least be as good as he was in the first 40 minutes.

But as Sullivan stated, it’s hard to lay this blown lead at the feet of the goaltender. There have been plenty of opportunities to do that for all three Pens’ goalies who have suited up this season.

And with the stakes as minimal as they are for a 14th-place team in mid-March, maybe it’s best to broaden our view of where the team is beyond just the blue paint anyway.

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