Is This Defense as Bad as We Feared?
The Pens’ defense struggled mightily in recent preseason contests. But, when faced with NHL-caliber talent last night vs. the Lightning, they played a fairly strong game as a unit and limited one of the more potent offenses in the league to very few scoring chances.
The most glaring reason for the uptick in effort was the absence of Rob Scuderi and Sergei Gonchar. Tampa is one of the younger, faster and more dangerous teams in the league. If the Pens would have deployed Scuderi or Gonchar it likely would have been a completely different game.
Ben Lovejoy had a few lapses in judgement, as he tends to have quite often and he was also exposed by Jonathan Drouin on the following goal…
Taking a bad angle on an attacking forward with less-than-optimal stick position will kill you in this league. Lovejoy has a tendency to do that a lot.
However, Lovejoy is still a respectable third-pairing defenseman. He’ll make his mistakes but he won’t bury you in that role. As long as the Pens pair him with either Adam Clendening or Brian Dumoulin he should be pretty sturdy back there.
If Scuderi and Gonchar are waived or at least consistent healthy scratches, I have a lot of confidence in this group to grow. If one or both are mainstays in the lineup, things could get ugly.
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