The Penguins see some progress with their power play

After his team largely struggled with its power play — going 1 for 7 with 10 shots — during Game 1 of their qualifying round series against the Montreal Canadiens at Toronto’s Scotiabank Arena, there was a pretty simple edict issued by Penguins coach Mike Sullivan.

“We’ve got to try to get some shots,” Sullivan said following that contest on Saturday.

That message appeared to be received during Monday’s Game 2.

While the Penguins went 0 for 5 with the man advantage, they launched 14 shots on net, a season-high for power-play shots this season.

Their previous high for power-play shots was 11, achieved twice during the regular season.

On their first power-play opportunity in Game 2 alone, they had five shots on six attempts. The first power-play unit saw forward Evgeni Malkin put three on net while forward Jake Guentzel missed the cage. Rookie defenseman John Marino also put two shots on net with the second power-play unit.

“As a group, we want to be more aggressive, have more movement, maybe by creating more shots,” said defenseman Kris Letang, who had two power-play shots, each in the second period. “But I think we had had tons of chances. If we put one or two in the net, we’d feel a lot better about ourselves. But we’ll keep working on it. I think we have the recipe in this group to be successful.”

The Penguins’ willingness to shoot with greater aplomb offered satisfaction to Sullivan.

“I thought we did a much better job,” Sullivan said via video conference from Toronto. “I thought we had some real good looks. There were a lot of pucks laying around the crease that we couldn’t get to. Some of them that we did get to, (Canadiens goaltender Carey) Price made some big saves on. We had a real abbreviated five-on-three (power-play sequence in the second period). We don’t execute on it. (Letang) fans on the one-timer, but he’s in a great scoring area. So they’re doing the right things out there. That’s the way we look at it.”

Still, Sullivan offered a critique of the team’s zone entries, which continued to struggle, particularly on their second power-play chance in the second period.

“Success on the entries a lot of times revolves around decision making, timing and cooperative play,” Sullivan said. “You’ve got to come together as a group. You’ve got to kind of come together with speed and then you have to make the right decisions at the critical areas of the rink. We can do a better job with the first pass. If we can make that first pass tape-to-tape, it certainly improves your opportunity of entering the offensive zone clean, with possession. But I don’t think it’s any one thing in particular. I think it’s a combination of things.

“We’ll watch the film with the guys, and we’ll practice that aspect of our game.”

The Canadiens might need to view an entire film catalog to fix their power play.

For as much scrutiny as the Penguins’ sputtering power-play has received, the Canadiens have been almost completely inert with their man advantage, which is 0 for 5 with only three shots in the series thus far.

“We got stuck on the walls (Monday), I think, a little bit too much,” Canadiens defenseman Shea Weber said. “Obviously, couldn’t get the puck off the wall to the middle of the ice. They were able to win those battles and get it down. Obviously, when the puck is on the wall and you’re not in possession, you’re not going to get anything.”

Neither team has gotten much from the power play this series. But the Penguins seem to have taken a step in the right direction after Game 2.

“Obviously, the power play, we’d like to be more successful on it,” Letang said. “I think it could give us a big advantage in games.”

Follow the Penguins all season long.