The Pittsburgh Penguins have seen a few lineup changes thanks to a new mindset from Mike Sullivan.

Heading into the 2023-24 NHL season, the Pittsburgh Penguins needed every aspect of the organization to be improved if they planned of finding their way back to the postseason.

Among those aspects included better and smarter coaching from the Penguins bench bosses, and Mike Sullivan took it upon himself to improve this year.

Prior to the beginning of the season, Sullivan noted he needed to be an improved coach for the team and do what he can to help create more wins.

Now, over a month into the season, Sullivan is looking to flex those muscles and make some of the proper changes.

The Penguins have played in 17 games, and already we’ve seen Sullivan pull the cord on players, handing out healthy scratches to under performing skaters.

Jeff Carter and P.O. Joseph are the most notable names to sit out some time for other options.

For their game against the Carolina Hurricanes, Sullivan swapped a struggling Rickard Rakell for Radim Zohorna within the lineup.

It wasn’t a healthy scratch for Rakell, who is yet to score a goal, but a little nudge to see if something changes with different linemates.

“We’re trying to move guys around based on performance and how certain guys are playing on a given night,” Sullivan said. “We’re trying to get more from other lines, so we started to move guys around a little bit.”

Pushing Zohorna to the second line and Rakell to the third didn’t bring much as no one on either group recorded a point.

The two were promptly put back to their original lines against the Vegas Golden Knights.

Sullivan stated he hopes that the small changes within the lineup may ‘spark something’ and he plans on being ‘proactive’ with those little adjustments.

One of Sullivan’s biggest flaws last season was his tendency to sit around on his lineup for too long and wait on making changes.

It’ll be interesting to see what Sullivan decides to do with Rakell, especially if he continues this poor start to the year.

Sullivan has given Rakell a few votes of confidence and is hopeful there will be an avalanche of production once he nabs his first goal.

Until then, however, what kind of move can wake up Rakell’s offense? His linemates of Evgeni Malkin and Reilly Smith have a visible chemistry and started the season red hot.

They’ve cooled off a bit, but are still finding each other all over the ice, and Rakell hasn’t been able to feed off of that connection.

Rakell has always played well on the first line with Sidney Crosby and Jake Guentzel, but is it the right time to take Bryan Rust off of that spot?

Rust is having a resurgent season with 16 points (9G-7A) in 17 games.

Sullivan will likely give Rakell a different look somewhere in the lineup in the coming days in hopes that something wakes up.

His goal is to remain vigilant with his lineup and make sure the right players are giving the Penguins the best chance to win every game.

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