The Pittsburgh Penguins have failed to live up to their early expectations while riding a seven game losing streak.
PITTSBURGH - The expectations were high on the Pittsburgh Penguins heading into the 2022-23 season.
A group of returning forwards who all contribute in their own way and a new and improved defensive core were supposed to help the Penguins look like one of the strongest teams in the NHL.
Through the first few games, they seemed like it, rattling off a 4-0-1 record through five, scoring six goals in each of their wins.
Seven games and no wins later, the Penguins look dejected and are quickly growing further away from their preseason expectations.
“When we don’t live up to the expectations that we have for each other… these guys take it to heart,” head coach Mike Sullivan said. “We all do. I know how much they care. We got to dig in a little bit more.”
It’s not like the Penguins have played overall bad hockey during their seven game skid; they’ve had leads and outplayed opponents, but haven’t been able to close the door.
“Look at the game as a whole we did a lot of good things,” Sidney Crosby said following their seventh straight loss. “We’re making a few mistakes. When you’re losing that’s magnified even more.”
If the Penguins were able to close out games where they looked like the better team or even held onto their leads, they wouldn’t be on a losing streak like this.
You could argue that the Penguins were the better team against the Boston Bruins, Buffalo Sabres, and their second matchup with the Seattle Kraken.
Had the Penguins been able to close those out we look at the western Canada swing as just a tough four games that they learned from.
While the Penguins hope to be learning from every passing game, they need to figure out how to close out games.
In each of their last three losses, the Penguins had a lead, but let it slip away.
“That’s the situation we’re in,” Crosby said. “We just got to try to build off of it and continue to play good hockey and trust that we’ll get rewarded.”
The Penguins have a tough trek ahead of the as they hit the road for six of their next seven games.
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