Pittsburgh Penguins: The Best Built Team in Hockey

The season’s just about come to its conclusion. With two games left, I want to discuss something I’ve been thinking about for most of this season. In my eyes, the Pittsburgh Penguins are currently the best built team in hockey.

Sounds crazy right? Especially given some of the things teams like the Chicago Blackhawks and even the Los Angeles Kings achieved over these past few years. But over a longer span, the Pittsburgh Penguins have achieved just as much, if not more, and has kept up the success up until this season.

This season has been tough on the Penguins among injuries and call-ups, but yet, we have excelled in almost every way possible. This is all because of how greatly built our team is.

So let’s all thank management for their great work on this team, and let’s look at exactly why I think the Penguins are the best built team in hockey.

Injuries Don’t Stop Us

Let’s face it. Injury wise, the Penguins have had the worst luck this season. We’ve lost key players like Evgeni Malkin, Carl Hagelin and Kris Letang. All of these players would be top players on any other team, and their contributions could make all the difference in a game. Any team losing key players like this would immediately start falling in the standings right?

Not exactly. In fact, the Penguins have played so well this season that they’re actually the second best team in the league! That’s right, even with half a healthy team, the Penguins have 111 points for second place in the entire league right behind Washington.

Any other team would crumble with a lack of key players like this. The Penguins however are so well built that we find amazing contributions from our depth players to still get the victories.

Pittsburgh Penguins

A Full Roster

Now imagine if we did have all our key players healthy this season.

We’re in second place. Washington may have clinched the President’s Trophy for this season, but they’re only five points ahead of us.

We’re already a team that could compete for the President’s trophy, even with an injured roster. If we had a full roster, there is no doubt in my mind we’d only be better–perhaps even winning the President’s trophy.

Our key players were replaced by a number of call-ups who have made seismic impacts for this team in their own right, like Jake Guentzel. Now that we know the high calibre of these players, if we combine them with our healthy key players on one roster we’d be incredible. This incredible force of talent is what the Penguins built.

Better Than the Blackhawks?

The Chicago Blackhawks are often considered the best team in hockey. A modern-day dynasty. Their three Stanley Cup wins in six years certainly back up these claims.

But the Penguins have two Stanley Cups in eight years. Maybe not as good in numbers, but the wins are definitely there. And as far as this season goes, our half-beaten up team is three points ahead of Chicago. We aren’t far off.

I’m not trying to make this about being better than the Blackhawks. One can very much argue that the Blackhawks achievements are of much higher value than the Penguins. But I wanted to compare them only because it shines a greater light on how well-built the Penguins are.

The Blackhawks are an amazingly built team, which they carefully and strategically built through the draft. The Penguins did this similarly, but our rebuild had actually started much earlier than the Blackhawks did. While each team achieved great things, the fact that the Penguins can still compete among the top of the league with the Blackhawks is amazing.

We have kept up our winning ways through carefully constructed moves, and all the effort has paid off. So what do you think? Are the Penguins the best built team in hockey? Let me know in the comments.

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