OTTAWA -- After making the playoffs in 2025-26, it's very clear to Kyle Dubas that it was a fluke and he never shied away from the fact of that exact ultimatum.
So far this season for these struggling Pittsburgh Penguins who sit as of November 13, third last in the Eastern Conference with 16 points and show heavy signs of the 2024-25 season all over again. From getting beat badly by really good teams to beating the bad teams everyone knows they should beat. The consistency level is non existent which allows for the team to struggle in just about every on ice area.
The culture in the locker room can't be good for a team with Sidney Crosby and Co. There are a lot of members from last team's squad that helped build last year's culture, but other NHL clubs have figured Dan Muse's playbook and style out rather quickly and has immediately become stale and predictable.
Kyle Dubas is open for business on every player except 87 and 81
Could it be called waving the white flag on the season just two months in? That can be up to any fan, analyst or reporter who has heard the obvious reports of the Penguins looking to fire sale all the veterans in order to go full on youth and instill speed and young blood into a older Pittsburgh hockey club.
What Pittsburgh lacks is the opportunity to play the young players who they say are highly regarded in the eyes of the scouts and upper management. Players like Rutger McGroarty, Harrison Brunicke, Bill Zonnon, Avery Hayes, Tristan Broz, Owen Pickering, Jake Livanavage and others are among those younger players who continue to be blocked by non-producing older veteran forwards and defense.
Kyle Dubas is looking to clean house on the veteran core in able to allow these players to finally play full time at the NHL level and actually fully commit to a rebuild that could have been done three to four years ago.
What will trouble Kyle is the fact a lot of the veteran players have NMC's or M-NMC's and they can block Dubas from trading them along with practically controlling their destiny's. Rickard Rakell in a report recently nixed a trade that would have sent him to Chicago that Kyle Dubas and Kyle Davidson were in agreement on.
Sidney Crosby is without a contract extension, Evgeni Malkin could be traded this season, Erik Karlsson is as good as gone. Kris Letang could very well be a wild card trade candidate. Not a good time to be a Penguins fan with the legends close to fading away into retirement or out of the Penguins sweater.
Has Kyle Dubas failed the Pittsburgh players and Fanbase?
A lot of people may say yes and a lot may say no, he has tons of work to do and his job very well could be on the line, as in the time he has been POHO and GM of the Pittsburgh Penguins with complete autonomy and the backing of now two separate ownership's have only cinched one playoff series which almost resulted in being swept.
Kyle has signed some detrimental and questionable contracts in his tenure so far like the Ryan Graves contract, the Andrei Kuzmenko contract and the Tristan Jarry contract for three big time examples.
The other side of the coin has seen him draft incredibly well, which has always been his strongest attribute and bring in some good players to the club who have helped do a really good job like Elmer Soderblom, Nick Robertson, Erik Karlsson and Tommy Novak.
What has been unfortunate is the plan two years in a row to build a team off throwing darts at the dart board on certain players who needed a change of scenery or struggled with their previous club. It isn't sustainable and this season so far is a living example of that.
Murashov needs to start more often in order to succeed
Dan Muse has gone to Arturs Silovs 12 times this season as of November 13, to Sergei Murashov's seven starts. The games that Murashov has been put in have been very unwinnable situations against monster built teams. Silovs has been getting more consecutive starts which will only make Murashov colder the moment he gets in net.
Splitting the starts like last season should come back into play in order to allow for consistency to be level between both goaltenders.
Right now it appears to be another bottom 10 season for the Penguins with suffering through another hard to watch season. Buckle up and enjoy the ride that is the 2026-27 season.
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