Pittsburgh Penguins locked in tight Wild Card race

BY HOME FIELD SPORTS STAFF REPORT

Over the past two weeks, the Pittsburgh Penguins have had some opportunities to extend their advantage in the Wild Card for the Eastern Conference. But consecutive losses and a 3-3-1 stretch over the past seven games have allowed teams in the pack to get close again.

Pittsburgh (34-24-10) currently holds the No. 1 Wild Card position in the East with 78 points. They are statistically tied with the New York Islanders but hold two games in hand over their Metropolitan Division foe. The Islanders, however, would have the tiebreaker with 30 wins in regulation to the Penguins’ 25.

The Penguins’ loss to the Islanders on March 9 was the beginning of this rocky stretch of play. Pittsburgh led New York, 3-1 late in the third period before giving up consecutive goals in the final 5:29 of regulation. The Islanders would win the game in overtime with a goal from Brock Nelson.

Pittsburgh was a -150 money line favorite in the game with the live betting having the Penguins as high as -280 in the third period before the Islanders made their comeback.

“It’s tough to swallow, it stings,” Penguins coach Mike Sullivan said after the game. “I feel bad for the players because I thought for the majority of the night we were the better team. We had some momentary lapses in the third and they got back in the game.”

Pittsburgh bounced back with a 5-1 win against the Philadelphia Flyers on March 11 and a 3-2 overtime win over the New York Rangers on March 12. The Penguins were a big -280 favorite over the Flyers and a -140 favorite over the Rangers.

But with an opportunity for Pittsburgh to begin to put distance between itself and the pack of teams in the Wild Card chase, the Penguins arguably put together their worst period of the season against the last-place Montreal Canadiens on Tuesday. Pittsburgh, a -360 favorite at FanDuel Sportsbook going into the game, took a quick 2-0 lead and then gave up four first-period goals to the Canadiens in a 6-4 loss.

“We came out strong and kind of let our foot off the gas and let them play an easy game,” Penguins defenseman Kris Letang said. “We didn’t have the same kind of urgency we had against the Rangers.”

Pittsburgh would get the Rangers on Thursday, the first of back-to-back games against the team, and take a 4-2 loss. Jake Guentzel tied the game at 2-2 with 10:51 remaining in the third period, but Chris Kreider scored the game-winner with 8:15 remaining and added an empty-net goal to make the final.

The Penguins play the Rangers for the third time in six days on Saturday in a nationally-televised game on ABC. Odds for that game had not been released at the time this was published.

Despite the slump, Pittsburgh’s odds to make the playoffs are still at -380, The Penguins are three points ahead of the Florida Panthers. The Panthers, who also have two games in hand against the Islanders, are -115 to make the playoffs.

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