When teams battle injuries, they must move players around in the lineup. For the Wilkes-Barre Scranton Penguins, that means playing rookies at center and moving players like Tanner Howe, who has only played 20 games at the American Hockey League level, up in the lineup.   

Howe started his AHL tenure as a depth forward. With the Penguins battling injuries and the NHL team calling up a few of their prospects, he’s moved to the Joona Koppanen and Rafael Harvey-Pinard line. “They get pucks back, they don’t spend a lot of time in their defensive zone, they drive play,” head coach Kirk MacDonald noted after the 5-1 win on Sunday in a conversation with The Hockey News. Howe moved to the top line and made the most of the opportunity, scoring a goal and adding three assists in the win.   

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