Pens vs. Bruins Preview

I've said all along that the Pens would have underachieved had they not won the East.  Coming into the playoffs, I had a really good handle on how they matched up against other teams in the Eastern conference, but really no idea how they matched up against anyone in the West, given the fact that the shortened season eliminated inter-conference play.  The only thing I knew for sure was this: Whoever the Pens had to face in the Eastern portion of the bracket, the odds and matchups were in their favor to win the series.

I believed that against the Islanders and the Senators and I believe it in the Eastern Conference Final against the Boston Bruins.

Like most of the teams in this side of the bracket, the Pens finished the season with a winning record against the Bruins, going 3-0-0 and winning three one goal games.  Now, the fact that all three games were close means that they were anyone's games.  But, you can't discount the fact that the Pens also won all three close games, because this figures to be a tight series.

Neither team has a huge name at goal tender, but Tuukku Rask is certainly more well-regarded and has more raw talent than Tomas Vokoun.  Then again, Marc-Andre Fleury has more renown and athletic ability than Vokoun and look where the two netminders stand at this point.  Fleury is officially Vokoun's backup and will only come in if the Bruins chase Vokoun or if it looks like the series is on the brink and Vokoun has lost his edge (like what happened against the Islanders and would've happened against the Flyers last year, had the Pens possessed two viable options at goal tender).  And, realistically, I don't think that Vokoun is going to get rattled enough that he loses the starting job.

He's not as flashy or exciting as Fleury, but he's extremely consistent.  The Pens don't need a guy with a high ceiling as long as he also has a high floor.  The Flower has has a high ceiling, but he also has a pretty low floor.  If the Pens can get competent, consistent goal tending, then they'll be able to score enough goals and protect their goal tender with their skilled defensemen enough that they don't need a guy like Jonathan Quick (who is amazing, BTW, and you should totally watch the Hawks-Kings series).

Vokoun has earned at least one mulligan.  You can't fault him for the double overtime loss against Ottawa and that's been his only loss since he came in.  He's been making the easy saves, making the vast majority of the tough saves, and hasn't let in any headscratchers.  If he can keep that up, I think that's more than sufficient from here on out.

Now, that's not to say I'm in love with the guy, but we're going to have to face facts here.  Regardless of who the Pens have in at goal the rest of the way, the other team is going to have the advantage at goal tender.  That's more praise for Quick, Rask, and Corey Crawford than it is a knock on Vokoun or Flower.  Thing is, I think the Pens can get past any goal tender if they get enough chances.  I think they can wear anyone down -- they sure dismantled a fantastic goalie like Craig Anderson in pretty short order -- and I think they have the talent and tenacity on offense to chase anyone out of the net.  I know that's a bold statement, but that's how much confidence I have in this offense.

Boston has an edge between the pipes and the Pens have an edge on offense, but I don't think it's a huge edge.  The Bruins can get hot and score goals in bunches.  They have four solid lines -- their fourth line in particular has been on fire since the playoffs started -- and their top line is the second best in hockey (after Kunitz-Crosby-Dupuis).  Their second and third lines don't match up as well against the Pens as their first and fourth -- especially if Jussi, Kennedy, Morrow, and Cooke continue to play about as well as they have -- but Boston has a ton of depth and can get on you in a hurry; just ask Toronto.

The difference in this series, for me, is defense and special teams.

Zdeno Chara can handle anyone and getting Dennis Seidenberg back is a big deal for the Bruins, but other than those two guys, they have a bunch of warm bodies and rookie overachievers (this is assuming Andrew Ference doesn't see any significant time until Game 3 or 4).  Chara and Seidenberg will either wear down or not be on the ice and guys like Torey Krug, Dougie Hamilton, and Pittsburgh's own Matt Bartkowski will come down to earth.  The defensemen for Boston have played well in the first two rounds, especially considering the injuries they've had to contend with.  But, if you took the best guys from Toronto and New York and made four lines out of them, you still wouldn't have four lines as good as what the Pens have been rolling with since the trade deadline.  The Bruins defensemen just haven't had to match up against this level of talent thus far in the playoffs and they're going to come back down to earth (hard) once they have to.

On the other hand, the Pens are now rolling with their full complement of defensemen and they have guys that can skate and score (Kris Letang, Paul Martin, and Simon Despres), an enforcer with some scoring upside in Doug Murray, and a couple guys who can do a little bit of everything in Brooks Orpik and Mark Eaton.  And, they're deep, so I feel comfortable with Engelland  or Niskanen -- or any of the combinations they've played during the course of the playoffs, because all these guys have seen time -- in the event that anyone goes down.  They have a ton of options and can play a bunch of different ways, even switching combinations and styles when they do line changes.  That flexibility -- which they're only just starting to take advantage of, since there were so many injuries throughout the course of the season -- makes this a very balanced and capable defense.

On special teams, Boston can't give the Pens more than three chances a game if they want to win this series. The power play for the Penguins is just too potent and, regardless of how good your penalty kill is, it's extremely difficult to shut them out on any given night.  Since goals will probably be flowing pretty freely, you don't want to give the Pens a stick to hit you with.  The biggest stick they have is that power play, particularly since James Neal appears to have found his scoring stroke back.  With Letang running point and Neal and Iginla sniping away from either side, then you add in Kunitz and/or Crosby and Malkin... that's just a deadly PP unit right there.  When you add in the fact that the Penguins are also very good at drawing penalties -- note that I didn't say diving, because they've really gotten away from that -- and it's a lethal combination.  You pretty much have to pick your poison.  It'll be interesting to see what strategy Boston goes with: Whether they'll let the Pens skate free and trust Rask to make a bunch of killer saves or if they'll clutch, hold, and slash in the hopes that the officials won't call anything this deep in the playoffs, dealing with the daunting task of killing a bunch of penalties if that strategy backfires.

In case I haven't made this abundantly clear, the Bruins are a great team.  The Pittsburgh Penguins are just better and they have a number of key advantages over Boston.  I think the Pens are feeling it now and they're incredibly focused on the prize.  When you take the talent that they have and add in determination, focus, and desperation, that's a dangerous team right there.  I think that it's possible that the Blackhawks could beat them in a seven game series at this point, but I don't see anyone else with the horses and the intangibles to match up.

If Boston can get all four of their lines rolling, if their young defensemen continue to play at the high level they've been playing, and if Rask only has one game where he gets overpowered and overwhelmed and if the Bruins can stay out of the penalty box, they can win this series.

But... that's a whole lot of "ifs" and too many for my blood.

Prediction:
Pens in 6

Pens vs. Lightning Playoff Primer

Ever since the Flyers clinched the division and the Pens got locked into a series with the Lightning, I've been trying to figure this series out.  The 4-5 match-up should be tough to handicap, but this one seems to be especially hard to figure out.

The teams split the season series two games apiece.  Tampa won the last meeting, but the Pens blew them out in the two before that.  The Pens have homefield advantage in the series, but Tampa scored 48 of their 103 points on the road and the Pens actually scored more points on the road than at home (fewer wins, but more overtime losses), so they may have been better off as the five seed here, but just for this series.

The Lightning have an explosive offense, led by stars and talented goal scorers and a serviceable defense with solid roleplayers.  The Pens have an excellent, disciplined defense with two good offensive defensemen (Kris Letang and Brooks Orpik) and a defensive forward in Jordan Staal, with a serviceable offense filled with solid roleplayers.  On offense, the Pens certainly have guys that can score, but none of them have scored consistently, which boils down to a lot of one goal wins.

With Staal, Kennedy, Neal, Kovy, Talbot, and DuPuis, the Pens do have a lot of talent and they have a lot of guys with playoff experience that can shoot the puck.  They have four pretty solid lines and don't have a weak link from top-to-bottom, especially when you consider that the defensemen are interchangeable and can support a weaker offensive line by creating opportunities in transition.  The trouble is that, without Crosby and Malkin, they don't have that one line that scares the hell out of everybody.  Tampa's first line scares the hell out of me, makes me think the Pens could lose this series.

Sure, defense wins championships, but goals win games.  Everything gets tighter and defensive teams usually have an edge when playoff time starts, but there's really no substitute for that one Uber-line that keeps the other team awake at night.

The experts on ESPN.com favor the Pens, with six out of eight picking them to advance past the first round.  That's comforting, but they also seemed convinced that the Flyers don't stand a chance against the Sabres, which I find tough to swallow.  I think those two series should be very even, with the team that wants it more and gets the most breaks coming out on top.

At any rate, I think that the Tampa offense -- especially the first line -- should be fairly negated by the Pens defense.  In order to really roll on the Pens defense, you need to go outside-inside by avoiding the middle of the ice in the crease and sweeping in to crash the net when you get in the opposing team's zone.  That's tough to do and I don't think Tampa has the talent to pull it off, but they could wear the Pens down eventually by spending a lot of time in the offensive zone.  Ultimately, this is a wash.

Tampa's defense isn't great, but neither is the Pens offense.  If any combination of the offensive roleplayers gets hot, then the Pens could smoke the Lightning in five games, but I doubt that happens.  It could be that they start to gel together during this series -- remember, there have been a ton of injuries aside from Crosby and Malkin and Kovy and Neal only joined the team in February -- and get hot in Game 6.  That's another longshot, though.  The most likely outcome is that the Pens grind out a lot of close games to advance and will (hopefully) be able to save their "signature" game for the later rounds.

Special teams is very nearly a wash with the Pens holding a slight advantage.  Even without Sid "diving" they still draw a fair number of penalties.  They're 26th in the league on the power play, but with enough chances, they could sneak a few key goals through, even against the 8th-ranked penalty kill.  The big advantage here is the Pens penalty kill, which is the best in the league.  If they can keep that up, they won't get caught with their pants down when they're shorthanded in a close game.

Offense and defense are a wash.  Special teams is basically a wash.  That means it comes down to goaltending.  Marc-Andre Fleury has been spectacular at times this season, especially in the last couple of months.  He's also had some troubling lapses in concentration this season, especially in the last couple of months.  Still, I would take Fleury over 41-year old Dwayne Roloson.  If he has two bad games in this series, the Pens are sunk.  Then again, if he has two bad games in any series, the Pens are sunk.  Roloson can't have a bad game and make it easy for the Pens to score.  That's the one area where they've struggled since their captains went down and any team that gives them hope and confidence is going to be in big trouble.

I'm not saying that Fleury is awesome and Roloson is a bum.  I'm saying that I trust Fleury to not have two bad games in this series more than I trust Roloson to not slip up occasionally (or have even one, entire bad game). 

I think Tampa's a great team and they could certainly win this series.  I just don't think that they will win it.

Prediction: Pens in 6