New Believers
Penguins prep for playoff run
By Bob Grove

There are plenty of ways to quantify the healing power of the perfect storm of change that hit the Penguins in mid-February and lasted for two and a half weeks. None, of course, would be better than a glance at the Eastern Conference standings after Sergei Gonchar finally laced up his skates, Dan Bylsma replaced Michel Therrien, Chris Kunitz arrived from Anaheim as the perfectly-configured missing piece to a heretofore jumbled puzzle and Bill Guerin escaped from Long Island.

The seemingly dead-in-the-water Penguins went from 10th place to fifth with a tidal wave of improvement, losing just one of their next 16 games in regulation. As Bylsma prodded his new team to force the action and not react to it, things began to happen at a quick pace - approximating the one at which he was imploring his team to play.

The moribund power play began to show real signs of life, thanks in no small part to Gonchar, and Bylsma's penalty killers hit success levels they hadn't reached all season. Jordan Staal found himself playing the best hockey of his three-year NHL career, and a refreshed Marc-Andre Fleury took his game to another level. Kunitz and Guerin, meanwhile, gave Sidney Crosby linemates with consistent touch, and Kunitz in particular provided a physical edge and front-of-the-net presence that had been sorely missed.

But with the Stanley Cup playoffs now on the horizon, a less tangible but more important development is clear: the Penguins have rediscovered their confidence.

"When things started to get rough a little bit, nothing going our way, we get a couple of bad bounces, we lose the game. We lose again. . . it kind of gets into your head a little bit," Fleury said, recounting the three-month funk that culminated with a 6-2 meltdown in Toronto Feb. 14 and the arrival of Bylsma the next day.

"I think everybody's a good hockey player here. I think a lot (of) it has to do with your head sometimes, the confidence that you have. I think right now the team is pretty confident. We've been able to come back in games or hold on to a lead."

One of Pittsburgh's recent third-period rallies - a league-high 11 of the Penguins' first 39 wins had come in games in which they trailed after the second period - illustrated how things had changed.

When the Penguins came back from a 3-0 deficit to beat Tampa Bay in early February, it was largely on the brilliance of Evgeni Malkin, who scored to start the rally, set up the tying goal and won the game in overtime. When Pittsburgh rallied in mid-March to beat Boston, the top team in the East, four different players scored goals in the third period - and none were named Malkin or Crosby.

"I think it just starts with our mentality of going after teams, not waiting for things to happen," said Crosby. "When you have that mentality, whatever position you're in, whether you're leading or trailing, when you have that it brings a sense of confidence. You really want to force the issue on teams, force them to make mistakes and make them uncomfortable. And when you can do that over a long period of time over the course of a game, it's tough to play against.

"We want to get in on forecheck, make it tough on their defense. We might not see immediate results in the first period, but as the game goes on, we play at that high pace, it's tough for teams to go through a whole game without making mistakes. So we give ourselves a good chance. We have to do that without making mistakes ourselves, and we've gotten better at that."

The emergence of Bylsma as an agent of change has been nothing if not unexpected. Just a year ago he was the assistant to Todd Richards with the Penguins' AHL affiliate in Wilkes-Barre/Scranton. But Richards went to San Jose as an NHL assistant last summer, and GM Ray Shero tapped Bylsma as his replacement and then turned to him again in February on an interim basis. A lot has happened to Bylsma in a short period of time, which gives him an appreciation for what has happened to the Penguins.

"We think the penalty kill is going to do the job; we think the power play is going to go out and do the job. We're counting on defensemen to play against other team's skill players, our goaltender is coming up with saves," he said. "When you have that belief that you add your part, you play your role, and we play a certain way. . . you can come back from 3-1, you can come out and jump on teams, you can withstand what you believe may be a bad call or a bad bounce.

"That's the development of a team that usually happens over 80 games and you hope you're hitting your stride over the last 15. We've had a short amount of time to do that. But I think the success in the past and what they were able to have last year is a building block for a part of the swagger, a part of the belief our guys have established in a short amount of time."

While a case could be made that Staal is the player whose game has transformed most dramatically in the new environment, one can do the same for Fleury. "I feel more calm, maybe," he says. "I know if I give up a goal, we'll be back. I give up two, we'll be back. So now maybe I can relax a little more and focus on one shot at a time and whatever happens, we still have a chance to win."

He felt that way because the Penguins in the past six weeks have tapped back into their heritage as an offensive force. In late March, with Malkin moved off the left point to his familiar position in the right circle and Gonchar patrolling the center point and scoring six goals in his first 15 games back, the power play was beginning to make a nightly difference. Kunitz was a large part of that as well, routinely screening opposing goaltenders and pounding home rebounds when he wasn't delivering body checks.

"He's a complete player," says Crosby. "He's feisty, he's got great hands around the net, smart, strong, wins puck battles, responsible defensively. He's really the complete package. He's not the biggest guy, but he leads by example the way he plays."

The guy on the other side of that line, Guerin, is nearing the end of a solid career but continues to find open spaces between and in the circles - where he's made a living launching goals. Crosby, of course, has had no problem finding him. "I'm having a great time, I can tell you that," Guerin said.

The other part of the special teams equation, the penalty kill, was also rejuvenated and went through a nine-game stretch in late March at almost 93 percent.

"We definitely brought some more details to our PK system," said Max Talbot. "We have options when we recover the puck that leads to clearing the puck faster, and more options where to clear the puck. And our goalie has been really good. So there's more details and it's easier to play. Last year in the playoffs," he adds with a knowing glance, "we had great special teams and that's what led to our run."

Last year's playoff march to the Finals is history, but its legacy hasn't been lost. Shouldn't be lost, says Crosby. Can't be lost, he insists.

"We lost, but it wasn't all for nothing," he said. "We took a lot of lessons from that, gained a lot of experience, and if there's a time to start using that, it's now. We've gone through a lot of tough games, a lot of tough situations together, so we're in that right now. We just want to keep building on what we've done so far."

Building on that is a lot easier when everybody is working from the same blueprint and has the confidence that it's the right one. That seems to apply to everyone in the Pittsburgh dressing room now that all those changes have sunk in.

"We've acquired some guys who have won the Cup, so I'm sure we're going to finish the season strong," Fleury says. "And anything can happen in the playoffs."