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2019.20 PITTSBURGH PENGUINS SEASON IN REVIEW GUIDE [This page was left blank intentionally.] pittsburghpenguins.com 2019.20 PITTSBURGH PENGUINS SEASON IN REVIEW GUIDE TABLE OF CONTENTS 2019.20 Season Review . 5 The Players . .29 Playoff Review . 115 Playoff History . 127 2019.20 SEASON REVIEW 6 | 2019.20 PENGUINS Regular-Season REVIEW 2019.20 NOTES SEASON RECAP and Winnipeg (324). Despite playing only 69 injury on Dec. 30, Guentzel was Pittsburgh’s The 2019-20 NHL season truly was unlike any games, Pittsburgh’s 302 man-games lost is team leader in goals (20), points (43) and other in NHL history. For the first time since the most since 2015-16 when the Penguins game-winning goals (4). His 20 goals were 1991-92, the NHL ceased playing games mid- had 315 man-games lost. All in all, Pittsburgh tied for 11th while his four game-winners season. However, unlike the labor dispute that had a fully healthy lineup for only two periods ranked ninth (tied) in the NHL, respectively. caused players to go on strike on Apr. 1, 1992, when they hosted Edmonton on Nov. 2. Over Because of the plethora of trades and recalls this season was halted the morning of March the course of the season, 34 skaters made an from the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins 12, 2020 due to the Coronavirus disease appearance with Pittsburgh and 21 of those over the course of the season, Pittsburgh had (COVID-19) pandemic, effectively cancelling 34 players missed at least one game due to a league-high (tied) 30 unique goal scorers, the remainder of the regular season. injury or illness. marking the most unique goal scorers for the Prior to the stoppage, Pittsburgh accumulated Every time a key player missed action the Penguins since they had 31 in 2003-04. a 40-23-6 record (86 points) in 69 games, Penguins showed resiliency, beginning with Evgeni Malkin’s 11-game absence in good for third place in the Metropolitan CAPTAIN CROSBY Division and seventh place across the entire October where the team went 7-4-0. On Captain Sidney Crosby followed up his NHL. The Penguins are the only team in the Nov. 14, the Penguins suffered a major blow 100-point season in 2018-19 with more NHL to have 13, 40-win campaigns since when Sidney Crosby underwent core muscle dominance while he was in the lineup for the 2006-07. San Jose has the second-most 40- surgery, causing him to miss 28 games. At Penguins. Crosby opened up the season with win seasons in that span (12). the time of the injury, Crosby led the team with 12 assists and 17 points in 17 games. a seven-game point streak (4G-8A), which The Penguins also extended the team’s During Crosby’s absence, the Penguins held doubled as the second-longest point streak of franchise-record streak of consecutive a 18-6-4 record with a league-high (tied) 40 his career to open up a season. Through the postseason appearances to 14. Pittsburgh’s points. Malkin picked up the slack in the 26 first 17 games, Crosby was Pittsburgh’s point playoff streak represents the longest active games he played without Crosby in the lineup, leader with 17 (5G-12A). postseason streak among all NHL teams, and accumulating 38 points (13G-25A). However, Crosby’s season took a turn for the since the 1967 NHL Expansion, the Penguins’ worse on Nov. 14, when it was announced playoff streak is tied for the eighth-longest As the season progressed, the news didn’t that he had undergone surgery to repair run of any club. get better for Pittsburgh as just hours after being named to his first NHL All-Star a core muscle injury and would go on to Game, Jake Guentzel suffered a shoulder miss the next 28 games. On Jan. 14, Crosby FOUR MORE YEARS injury, causing him to miss the final 30 returned to the lineup with a bang, recording General manager Jim Rutherford made a lot regular-season games. At the time of his a season-high four points (1G-3A) in a win at of moves in the offseason prior to the start home over the Minnesota Wild. He would then of the 2019-20 season, but maybe none more important than re-signing head coach Mike Sullivan to a four-year contract extension on July 5 to keep him at the helm until the conclusion of the 2023-24 campaign. Sullivan hit a pair of milestones this past season. First, he appeared in his 500th career NHL game as a head coach on Dec. 21 at Vancouver (336 games with Pittsburgh and 164 games with Boston). Shortly after that, on Jan. 7 in Vegas, Sullivan became just the third head coach in team history to win 200 games with the team, joining Dan Bylsma (252) and Ed Johnston (232). PLAYING HURT What the Penguins did during the 2019- 20 season with the injuries they had was nothing short of remarkable as they had 302 man-games lost, the fourth-most in the NHL behind Columbus (419), Buffalo (330), 2019.20 PENGUINS Regular-Season REVIEW | 7 2019.20 NOTES CONTINUED go on a tear, recording 30 points (11G-19A) in 24 games following his return to the lineup, the fifth-highest point total (tied with teammate Evgeni Malkin) in the NHL during that span. Overall, Crosby finished the season with 47 points (16G-31A) in 41 games. Crosby also had the distinction of becoming the 32nd player, and sixth-fastest player in NHL history, to record 800 career assists on March 3 against the Ottawa Senators (1G-2A). Only Wayne Gretzky (527), Mario Lemieux (661), Paul Coffey (880), Adam Oates (919) and Bryan Trottier (969) reached 800 assists faster than Crosby, who accomplished the feat in 980 games. MALKIN’S RESURGENCE Evgeni Malkin came into training camp promising to be better than he was in 2018-19 – a season where he picked up 72 points (21G-51A) in 68 games but was a team-worst minus-25. It’s safe to say that Malkin delivered on his promise. The Russian center was arguably Pittsburgh’s most consistent player all season, finishing with a whopping 74 points (25G-49A) in 55 games. Despite missing 14 of Pittsburgh’s 69 games this season, Malkin finished 14th in the NHL © GETTY IMAGES © GETTY in scoring while his 1.35 points-per-game average was tied for sixth-best in the league. His 0.89 assists per game (49 assists in 55 Malkin’s season was also filled with time the season concluded, Jarry not only games) ranked fourth in the NHL behind milestones as he continues to climb the NHL earned that spot on the roster – he was a Connor McDavid (0.98), Leon Draisaitl (0.94) all-time ranks. He scored his 400th career 2020 NHL All-Star that had set career highs and Artemi Panarin (0.94). goal on Dec. 17 at Calgary. In doing so, he in games played (33), wins (20), goals-against became the fourth Penguin, and 99th player average (2.43), save percentage (.921) and Malkin was downright dominant in the 28 in NHL history, to score 400-plus goals. Of shutouts (3). He finished in the top-10 among games that Sidney Crosby missed due to a those 99 players, 52 of them are enshrined in all NHL goaltenders in save percentage (T-8th), core muscle injury from Nov. 12-Jan. 12, as he the Hockey Hall of Fame, and another 14 are goals-against average (9th) and shutouts had a team-best 38 points (11G-27A) in the still active players or have not yet been out (T-8th). 26 games he played, helping the Penguins to of the NHL long enough to be eligible to be an 18-6-4 record and league-best .714 points elected. On Jan. 12 at Arizona, Malkin picked Jarry shined during the month of December percentage during that span. up his 641st career assist, surpassing Jaromir when he was named the NHL’s Second Star Jagr for sole possession of third place on of the Month. He appeared in nine games, Malkin hit the 20-goal plateau for the Pittsburgh’s all-time assist list. Just over a going 8-1-0 with a 1.54 goals-against seventh-straight year, and 12th time overall, month later on Feb. 26, he became the third average, a .947 save percentage and three tying him with Crosby and Mario Lemieux player in team history to skate in 900 career shutouts. Jarry’s eight wins, 1.54 goals- for the most 20-goal seasons in franchise NHL games. against average and three shutouts ranked history. He also became the fourth active, first among all NHL netminders in December, and 31st player in NHL history, to have 11 or while his .947 save percentage was second- more seasons with 70-plus points when he AHL TO ALL-STAR best (minimum five starts). He was also registered his 70th point on March 7 against The 2019-20 season was a whirlwind for named the NHL’s Second Star for the week Washington. Only Lemieux (12) has more goaltender Tristan Jarry. His season started ending Dec. 8, the week he posted back- 70-point campaigns in franchise history than with a battle against Casey DeSmith during to-back shutouts. Jarry’s eight wins were Malkin’s 11. training camp for the second goaltender spot tied with Andrei Vasilevskiy for the most in on the roster along with Matt Murray.