The Pittsburgh Penguins were back to work in Cranberry on Sunday after dropping Game 1 to the Philadelphia Flyers on Saturday night.
They only scored two goals in the 3-2 loss and weren't close to their best. They had a lot of trouble breaking through the Flyers' trap and couldn't exit their zone cleanly.
Sidney Crosby was especially quiet, which is rare for him against the Flyers. He has tormented them throughout his career, but the Flyers did a great job defending against him and his line.
Speaking of his line with Egor Chinakhov and Bryan Rust, it appears to be staying together heading into Game 2 on Monday. In fact, it looks like Muse is keeping all of his lines and pairings together for Monday's game.
- If the Penguins find themselves down in this game or if they lose it, then I think you'd see head coach Dan Muse change some of the lines. I'd still like to see Chinakhov back with Evgeni Malkin at some point since those two had such great chemistry during the regular season.
- Muse danced around a starting goaltender question after Sunday's practice wrapped up, saying he'd announce who his starter is on Monday. I'd be stunned if it wasn't Stuart Skinner after how great he played on Saturday. He was the only reason why the Penguins had an outside chance of tying the game late in the third period, and he made several big saves on odd-man rushes and breakaways.
If he can keep giving the Penguins goaltending like that, they'll have a really good shot of winning this series.
- The Girard-Letang pair had a lot of momentum heading into the playoffs before falling flat in Game 1. The pair accounted for only 2.5% of the expected goals during the game, which is woeful.
Letang struggled to break the puck out of the defensive zone and generate offense, largely because of the Flyers' structured defense. After practice, he spoke about the way the Flyers made it difficult and how the Penguins can get past their trap.
"I think it's just to play with speed," Letang said. "Like I said, the transition game is really good, so if you play in front of them instead of behind them, you give them a chance to counter with speed, and they have really skilled forwards that can make you pay."
The Flyers' speed was on display throughout the game, and they generated several high-quality chances, despite scoring only three goals. It's on the Penguins to limit those chances against and to get more high-danger chances of their own.
Puck drop for Game 2 is set for 7 p.m. ET on SportsNet Pittsburgh and ESPN.
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