Game Preview: Pittsburgh Penguins @ Edmonton Oilers 10/24/2022 - Lines, how to watch

Who: Pittsburgh Penguins (4-0-1, nine points, 1st place Metropolitan Division) @ Edmonton Oilers (2-3-0, four points, 5th place Pacific Division)

When: 8:00 p.m. Eastern

How to Watch: AT&T Sportsnet in Pittsburgh, NHL Network outside of the Western PA local viewing market (SN1, TVAS up in Canada)

Opponent Track: Tonight wraps up a six game homestand for the Oilers, they’ve yet to play a road game in the young season. They’ve gone: W, L, L, W and L in a fairly underwhelming start. After scoring six goals in a win over Carolina on Thursday, Edmonton was shutout in a 2-0 loss their last game out on Saturday against St. Louis. Tough team to figure out early, with no rhyme or reason for consistent performances so far.

Pens Path Ahead: It’s a quick turnaround to Calgary tomorrow night as the road trip rolls on. Then the boys will have some time for team bonding and a few days off until playing in Vancouver on Friday.

Season Series: Set your calendar for Thursday February 23rd as the day Connor McDavid comes to Pittsburgh.

Getting to know the Oilers

SB Nation counterpart: Copper n Blue

Possible lines

FORWARDS

Evander Kane - Connor McDavid - Kailer Yamamoto

Ryan Nugent-Hopkins - Leon Draisaitl - Zach Hyman

Warren Foegele - Ryan McLeod - Jesse Puljujarvi

Devin Shore- Derek Ryan

DEFENSEMEN

Darnell Nurse / Cody Ceci

Brett Kulak / Tyson Barrie

Ryan Murray / Evan Bouchard

Markus Niemelainen

Goalies: Jack Campbell or Stuart Skinner

Scratches: Dylan Holloway (injured)

IR: Oscar Klefbom, Mike Smith, Tyler Benson

—Hey, another 11F+7D team! Similar to how Pittsburgh before yesterday’s roster moved, the Oilers also have virtually no cap space and are only carrying 12 forwards at the start of the season. One of them, rookie Dylan Holloway, was injured last week. Edmonton has actually dressed seven defenders in three out of their five games on the season, this alignment is nothing new and might be what they deal with for a while. They also load up the ice time for their top and best eight forwards, so it’s not a huge deal for them, but a pretty unusual arrangement.

—Cody Ceci is averaging playing 21 minutes per game this season and has done a nice job fitting in and filling a big role in Edmonton. His career rejuvenation in Pittsburgh was a great story and total success. He’ll never win the Norris, but he is a legitimate solid and steady top-four defenseman in the NHL.

Stats

via hockeydb

—Well, it looks like McDavid off to a McDavid-ian start, oh goodie. By the way, can we talk about how last season McDavid tallied 1G+3A in each of the two games against Pittsburgh? Must have been still mad about Sid’s OT goal a few years back. Anyways, calm down a little McDavid, take it easy jeez. So, ah, good luck to Dumoulin and Letang but at least it’ll be tough to get burnt by him this year as much as he did to the Pens last year. (Note to Connor: this is not a challenge).

—There’s probably not a more under-appreciated or over-looked player in the league than Draisaitl, who is something of the Evgeni Malkin of the new generation. Draisaitl’s stats boil down to AVERAGING a 50 goal and 116 point season pace since 2018-19. His 181 goals in this stretch trail only Auston Matthews (and only by five goals). Draisaitl’s points are second only to McDavid and 63 more than the next closest to him (Nathan MacKinnon). Despite not receiving a lot of attention or adoration outside of Edmonton, there’s a strong case to be made that Leon Draisaitl is the second best player in the NHL these days.

—The Oil paid Campbell $25 million in free agency to come over from Toronto and there’s still a long way to go, but it hasn’t been the greatest of starts for the beginning of his Edmonton career.

—For Edmonton to really make it, they’re probably going to need a secondary option to step up and emerge from Jesse Puljujarvi and Kailer Yamamoto. Both were high draft picks that have some skill, but neither has made a mark for the consistent application of that skill to translate into production. It’s been a very quiet start for both of those players, and perhaps relatedly, it’s been a somewhat slow start for Edmonton, too.

And now for the Pens...

Potential Game Lines

Forwards

Danton Heinen - Sidney Crosby - Rickard Rakell

Jason Zucker - Evgeni Malkin - Bryan Rust

Brock McGinn - Jeff Carter - Kasperi Kapanen

Drake Cagguila - Ryan Poehling - Josh Archibald

Defense

Brian Dumoulin / Kris Letang

Marcus Pettersson / Jeff Petry

P.O. Joseph / Jan Rutta

Goalies: Tristan Jarry or Casey DeSmith

Scratches: Jake Guentzel (upper body injury), Chad Ruhwedel, Sam Poulin

IR: Teddy Blueger

—The Pens practiced yesterday and Guentzel joined towards the end in a no contact jersey. Coach Mike Sullivan said afterwards that there is a possibility that Guentzel could play on this road trip. By virtue of going on LTIR, Blueger will not be eligible to play on this road trip but skated with the team in a no-contact fashion, as he consistently has for the last few weeks.

—Being on the back-to-back, it figures that DeSmith will be playing one of the next two games. Last season both Jarry and DeSmith each started one game a piece vs. EDM. Both gave up four goals and both lost. So pick your poison, I suppose, this will be the toughest offensive test the Pens have faced all season.

—The power play will look different with no Guentzel:

Can’t say I’m a fan of adding not only a second defenseman to the power play but a second RH shot as well, which is redundant with Letang out there. Petry has typically not had a very positive power play impact previously in his career, perhaps he will buck those trends in a new system. With the way things are going, putting Rakell, Zucker as a net-front presence or even Heinen as the hot hand would probably give a different look and better edge than Petry, but we shall see how that unfolds.

Gamblers corner

• $5.00 on over 3.5 Connor McDavid shots (-125, to pay $9.00)
• $5.00 on over 2.5 Bryan Rust shots (-140, to pay $8.57)

Relying on four+ shots is a big ask, but McDavid has gotten to that mark in four out of five games this season, and he’s always primed for big nights against the Penguins.

Rust has 15 shots in five games (for an even three per game) this season, but only had one SOG last game against Columbus. Here’s to figuring Rust “gets back to his game” and is shooting the puck more, perhaps with a bigger focus on the power play with Guentzel out of the mix.

Season picks: 5-2, +1.424 units