Penguins find balance in shootout win against Blues

With roughly six weeks remaining the regular season, Mike Sullivan is trying some new things.

Research and development, if you will.

The Penguins’ coach has flipped the right wingers on the team’s top two lines and he’s all but shuffled his defensive pairings using a bingo cage the past handful of games.

Just don’t call it experimenting.

“We’ve moved guys around all year,” Sullivan said to media in St. Louis on Thursday. “So I don’t know that ‘experimenting’ is the right word. We’re trying to put combinations together that give us the balance that we need.”

Whatever you want to label it, Sullivan achieved that equipoise in a 3-2 road shootout win against the St. Louis Blues at the Enterprise Center.

Penguins forward Bryan Rust scored the lone goal in the shootout while goaltender Tristan Jarry stopped the Blues on all four of their shootout attempts to claim victory.

The scales were tipped pretty early in the contest, however, when the Blues were gifted an extended two-man advantage only 35 seconds into regulation thanks to a delay of game penalty against Penguins defenseman Kris Letang (nine seconds in) and an ensuing high-sticking infraction against forward Jeff Carter.

Despite having 1:34 of a five-on-three power-play opportunity to operate with, the Blues could only muster three shots resulting in no offense thanks to the efforts of Penguins forwards Teddy Blueger, Brian Boyle, Evan Rodrigues and Rust as well as defensemen Brian Dumoulin and John Marino.

“(They penalty killers) awesome,” Jarry said. “They were pushing guys to the outside. That was the key. The top two (attacking players) were pushing down. They were a little stressed and under pressure the whole time. That helped a lot. They weren’t able to get the puck in the spots that they wanted to get a good shot. The guys did a great job on clears. They were able to change a lot. That was key.”

Having the first lead was key too. That was achieved when the Penguins’ reconfigured third defensive pairing helped stake out the game’s first lead at 14:42 of the first period. In the Blues’ right circle, Carter outmuscled Blues forward Ivan Barbashev on a draw, allowing Penguins forward Radim Zohorna to slide the puck to the right point. From there, Penguins defenseman Marcus Pettersson controlled the puck, surveyed the zone for a moment then fed the puck to center point where defensive partner Chad Ruhwedel stroked a one-timer that sailed through traffic and past goaltender Ville Husso’s blocker for his third goal of the season, a new career-high. Pettersson and Zohorna had assists.

Another goal from the blue line supplied the Penguins with a two-goal advantage at 10:52 of the second period. From the right wing, just behind the center red line, Penguins forward Kasperi Kapanen banked a pass off the far-side boards and provided entry into the offensive zone for Penguins defenseman Mike Matheson. Taking the puck off the wall, Matheson glided to the left circle and lasered a far-side wrister past Husso’s glove that clunk off the post and into the cage for his ninth goal. Kapanen and Marino collected assists.

Ex-Penguins forward David Perron got the Blues on the scoreboard at 16:55 of the middle frame with an impressive individual effort. After a wrister by Marino from the Blues’ right circle was blocked by Blues defenseman Colton Parayko, Barbashev settled the rebound below the left circle then chipped it across the ice to the center red line for Perron. Challenging Matheson one-on-one off the right wing, Perron got a step on the Penguins defenseman, shielded the puck and cut across the front of the crease and roofed a wrister over the glove of an outstretched Jarry for his 18th goal. Assists went to Barbashev and Parayko.

The contest was tied, 2-2, only 1:49 into the third period. Penguins forward Evgeni Malkin won a faceoff in his own right circle, Blues forward Brandon Saad, a Gibsonia native, outmuscled Ruhwedel for the puck behind the net, emerged to the left of the cage and backhanded a pass into the crease. After glancing off Jarry’s stick, the puck slid to the right of the blue paint where Barbashev beat Pettersson for position and jabbed in a forehand shot for his 19th goal. Saad had the lone assist.

Even after surrendering a two-goal lead, Sullivan found reason for optimism.

“The best part for me was when they tied the game up, it didn’t affect our mindset just as far as playing on our toes and getting back to the game that we think gives us the best chance to win,” Sullivan said. “We just got back to work and just tried to keep playing the game to play to our strengths. That was a real encouraging part to me.”

After a thrilling overtime period in which each squad exchanged quality chances, the Penguins claimed victory in the shootout.

After Penguins forwards Sidney Crosby, Jake Guentzel and Letang were stifled by Husso and Jarry denied Blues forwards Jordan Kyro, Perron, Vladimir Tarasenko and Ryan O’Reilly, Rust supplied his team with a win by snapping a wrister past Husso’s glove.

Jarry improved his record to 30-12-6 by making 23 saves on 25 shots in regulation and overtime as his team defeated one of the top squads in the Western Conference.

“It definitely feels good to play a good, hard game, control the game most of the time, deal with a little bit of adversity but still get the win,” Rust said. “That’s going to be big for our group, especially down the stretch here. As we (get closer) to the postseason, there’s going to be times when … things aren’t going our way or things aren’t going as good as we think. We’ve just got to keep fighting. That’s what we did tonight.”

Notes:

• Pettersson returned to the lineup after being a healthy scratch for two games. He replaced defenseman Mark Friedman who had been in the lineup for the previous eight games.

• Penguins forward Zach Aston-Reese was scratched for the second consecutive game, though it wasn’t clear if he was still dealing with the aftereffects of an illness that forced him to miss Tuesday’s 4-1 road loss to the Nashville Predators.

• Penguins forward Brock McGinn missed his third consecutive game due to a suspected right hand or arm injury.

• Jarry (89 wins) surpassed Denis Herron (88) for fifth place on the franchise’s career goaltending win list.

• Crosby had a 10-game scoring streak snapped.

• The Penguins matched a season high with 45 shots. They previously reached that mark in a 6-2 road loss to the Los Angeles Kings on Jan. 13 and a 4-2 road win against the Boston Bruins on Feb. 8.

• Husso was the sixth Finnish-born goaltender the Penguins have faced this season. A look at how goaltenders from that country have fared against the Penguins in 2021-22:

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