Rossi: The best Penguins defense is ... a potent offense

Paul Martin, the free-agent-to-be who presumably isn't in the Penguins' long-term plans, offered this obvious albeit accurate observation about physical defensemen and NHL rosters: “You'd like to have a couple.”

General manger Jim Rutherford doesn't make a habit of asking what I'd like for the Penguins, but the answer is another scoring winger. That's the case even though I'm convinced a defensive corps consisting of proven puck movers and Rob Scuderi will get rolled by any playoff opponent with the ability to get pucks deep.

Yeah, more scoring, because filling the net has proven a problem for these Penguins. They were at 4.12 goals per game before facing Los Angeles at Consol Energy Center on Thursday night.

The defending champion Kings were at 2.56. The Penguins weren't even holding opponents to that few goals, allowing 2.75 per contest.

So at first glance, it seems silly to suggest the Penguins — currently channeling the 1980s Edmonton Oilers, or at least the Penguins of March-April in 2012 — need to add another scoring winger.

They do. They must. They won't win without one.

The Eastern Conference stinks, like it has for the past two seasons. Only now, Boston's Bruins aren't so big or bad. It's time for the Penguins to do what they did in 2008 and '09 and take advantage of an average-at-best conference and get to the Final.

The sneaking suspicion here is that all of the Penguins' offseason moves were part philosophical differences between the business and hockey sides, and maybe more because of aesthetics than anybody initially hinted.

Seemingly, a big part of new coach Mike Johnston's job is to make the Penguins look like the Penguins again, and that means more than just players placing a lot of pucks behind opposing goalies.

It means doing so without apologizing, even after losses.

Ownership wasn't bothered that the higher-seeded Penguins fell short the past few springs. It was how they fell short. The Penguins averaged only 1.58 goals in 12 losses to the Flyers, Bruins and Rangers over three series.

Mario Lemieux, the Penguins' icon-turned-majority co-owner, basically was good for a goal and an assist against each of those teams when he played in the playoffs. He couldn't have liked seeing his heirs as scoring-champion centers, Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin, combine to produce 10 goals in series their Penguins lost rather embarrassingly.

Rutherford has said this regular season is about players developing good habits that will help them perform better when the playoffs arrive and the NHL becomes a league of clutching, grabbing and plodding hockey, watchable only because series are an every-other-day test of will, fortitude and human limitations.

Basically, the playoffs look like every game played by the Kings.

The Penguins can't look like the Kings. It isn't in the organization's DNA. It's not that their players aren't tough or don't want to win championships. They are. They do.

These players are Penguins, however. Eventually, even new winger Patric Hornqvist — so refreshing for his lack of interest in any kind of passes, especially the pretty ones — will become a Penguin.

That isn't a problem. Identity is a key component for any title team.

The Penguins should embrace theirs. So should Rutherford.

Know your strengths. Embrace them. Play to them.

It might not be possible for an offensive-minded team to win the Cup, but it's certainly impossible to believe the Penguins will win it again without trying to outscore opponents in the playoffs. This team, even with a 40-percent overhaul by Rutherford, remains built to fill the net.

The top four defensemen are puck movers. Their instructions, Martin said, are “to support (puck carriers) and pinch (offensively) when possible.”

The Kings don't play that way. They wouldn't try to because the Kings know who they are, and they're not the team that thinks about scoring goals.

The Penguins used to know who they are, but they tried too hard to forget after that loss to the Flyers in the 2012 playoffs. They failed to look at how they were in control of Games 1 and 2, and instead only considered that losing leads in those contests turned the series forever in the Flyers' favor.

I remember what that series was really like: the Flyers, despite taking a 3-0 series lead, were always scared silly the Penguins would find a way back, because the Penguins were great at the one part of hockey that other NHL teams couldn't figure out.

The Penguins could score goals. That's always been what made them dangerous, and occasionally supreme. If they're ever going to win big again, they'll have to do it their way.

Who are the Penguins?

They're the NHL team that scores in bunches, and looks to add more scorers.

Rob Rossi is a staff writer for Trib Total Media. Reach him at rrossi@tribweb.com or via Twitter @RobRossi_Trib.