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It’s Pittsburgh Penguins Day at PHT

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Eddie Olyczyk looks back on his stint coaching the Pittsburgh Penguins and working with Sidney Crosby as a rookie.

Each day in the month of August we’ll be examining a different NHL team — from looking back at last season to discussing a player under pressure to identifying X-factors to asking questions about the future. Today we look at the Pittsburgh Penguins.

2018-19
44-26-12, 100 points (3rd in the Metropolitan Division, sixth in the Eastern Conference)
Playoffs: Lost in four games to the New York Islanders in the first round.

IN:
Alex Galchenyuk
Dominik Kahun
Brandon Tanev
Pierre Olivier-Joseph

OUT:
Phil Kessel
Olli Maatta
Matt Cullen

RE-SIGNED:
Chad Ruhwedel
Zach Aston-Reese
Teddy Blueger
2018-19 Summary

Anytime you have Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and Phil Kessel on your roster, expectations are going to be high for your hockey club. Unfortunately for the 2018-19 Penguins, they didn’t live up to the hype.

The Pens won two of the first five games of the regular season, but they seemingly got back on track by sweeping f four-game road trip that took them through Toronto, Edmonton, Calgary and Vancouver. They followed that up by dropping their last game of October and the first four games of November. That’s pretty much how the season went for the Penguins. They appeared to be stuck in the mud during long stretches.
[MORE: Under Pressure | Three Questions | X-Factor]

Pittsburgh made the playoffs, but they were quickly swept by their division rivals, the New York Islanders, in the opening round. With that kind of ending to their season, we knew that changes would be coming. They never seemed to get the chemistry down. From new players to veterans, they never looked like the dominant Penguins we’ve grown accustomed to seeing.

One of the players that didn’t look like himself was Malkin. Yes, he finished with 72 points, which most players would be thrilled with, but he wasn’t his usual dominant self. There were whispers about him potentially being moved, but that never materialized this summer.

“We just felt that as a group, we didn’t come together the way we should have or could have in order to maximize the potential of our group,” head coach Sullivan said, per NHL.com. “It’s not any one person or two people’s fault. It’s the responsibility of everybody involved to make sure that they’re making a positive contribution in that regard.

So they decided to make some significant moves this offseason. General manager Jim Rutherford traded Kessel to Arizona for Alex Galchenyuk and he also spent significant money and term to land free-agent Brandon Tanev, who adds size and strength to the group. Olli Maata was also traded away to Chicago for Dominik Kahun.

Getting Galchenyuk, Kahun and Tanev comfortable will be a priority, but those three players need to come in and be difference makers for a veteran team that needed some new blood.

Can the Penguins become the team to beat in the Metropolitan Division, again? On paper, it sure look like they can, but they have a lot to prove this season.

MORE:
ProHockeyTalk’s 2019 NHL free agency tracker
Your 2019-20 NHL on NBC TV schedule

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Joey Alfieri is a writer for Pro Hockey Talk on NBC Sports. Drop him a line at phtblog@nbcsports.com or follow him on Twitter @joeyalfieri.