Only one preseason game remains. After today’s practice, only one remains until the regular season starts. In a mere five days the Penguins will begin the 2026-2027 season in Philadelphia. The Penguins roster cuts were coming with Monday’s deadline approaching, and Pittsburgh made another round just before Friday’s practice started.
Penguins Roster Cuts Send Avery Hayes Down and Thin the Prospect Field
It’s somewhat surprising to see Avery Hayes sent down a few days before the roster deadlines. I think Hayes has stood out throughout the preseason and camp. I also think his ability to be a rat is something the team needs. However, I think they are sold on a fourth line of Hallander, Dewar, and Soderblom leaving no space for Hayes. Both of the Ruck twins were returned to juniors which was expected and definitely what’s best for their development. So, only a few young players remain in camp including Pickering, Brunicke, McGroarty, Broz, Livanavage and Zonnon. Unfortunately, it seems that none of them will be playing opening night in Philadelphia. The forwards had a real opportunity to stake their claim for a spot after finding out Kindel’s injury is more significant than the initial prognosis indicated. None of them decided to take the ball and run with it as a prospect heavy roster got shutout by Columbus last night.
The coaching staff must have agreed with my analysis because as practice began, most of the players listed above did not take the ice. The only young players who saw the ice today were Ville Koivunen, Bill Zonnon, and Harrison Brunicke. Of those three players, only Koivunen took part of regular line rushes. Koivunen appears to have slotted in as the Kuzmenko replacement. If you haven’t heard, Kuzmenko’s father was tragically killed by a bear in Siberia and will be going home to Russia to be with his family for an undisclosed period of time. If not for the horrible incident regarding Kuzmenko’s father Koivunen would have likely been sent down to the AHL too.
The goaltending battle was decided, though it was not shocking. Today in practice only Murashov and Silovs took the ice with the team. Joel Blomqvist will be sent back to the AHL and serve as their starter. I still believe that we will Joel in the NHL this season, but we almost certainly will not next Wednesday.
As for the players who were on the ice the lines are pretty consistent with our projections and followed the same look as they have since camp opened.
Despite the Kindel and Kuzmenko situations, I still like the idea of spreading the wealth with Rust on the third line. I have remained steadfast that I think the d-pairs make sense. I don’t really anticipate Zonnon being an extra forward, nor Brunicke, so keeping them on the ice today was interesting. I just don’t see how they can supplant anyone above them given their waiver eligibilities.
One thing about practice today that has me curious, and maybe furious, is the apparent configuration of the power-play units.
I understand Malkin being on PP2. I know he was a point per game player, but his cavalier nature on the power-play can be a detriment. He has always been rather cavalier, but he used to have the legs to get back on defense as he has aged though that facet of his game has disappeared. My bigger issue is removing Malkin for Tommy Novak. I understand that from an analytic standpoint Novak was our best power-play forward last season but anyone with eyeballs knows the stats are wrong in this scenario. Also, anyone with eyeballs knows that Egor Chinakhov might be the most perfect power-play forward in the league. Chinny has the shot, the vision, and the speed to make the power-play become absolutely prolific. I truly do not understand how the coaches came up with this configuration. If you are going to give the top unit seventy-five percent of the power-play time, then you are leaving your best shot (literally) sitting on the bench for a minute and a half of the man advantage. That just seems insane to me. Technically it’s still preseason and things could change between now and Wednesday, but it sure seems like today’s practice units were an opening night preview.
No matter what the power-play lines end up being, or who’s playing in goal it seems like the weight of team is still on Crosby and Malkin. At least it is to start the season. The losses of Kindel, Lizotte, and Kuzmenko are somewhat replaceable, but it will hurt the Penguins to start the year. Therefore the 39-year-old and 40-year-old are to team up, once again, and carry this team through the early stages of the season.
At least this year, they will have a bright new goalie backstopping for them.
