Mark Madden: Time for the Penguins to deal with reality, not long-shot fantasy

We can hold two truths to be self-evident in the wake of the Pittsburgh Penguins’ four-game losing streak that got extended Thursday at PPG Paints Arena via a 7-2 massacre by Edmonton:

• The Penguins should be sellers between now and the March 3 NHL trade deadline.

• They need a Plan B. They can’t play up-tempo, pinching, activating, attacking, high-octane, speed-and-skill-uber-alles hockey anymore. They don’t have enough speed and skill.

The Penguins will chafe under the yoke of those conclusions, perhaps ignoring them. But both are painfully obvious.

The Penguins are just one point out of a wild-card berth as of this writing and have games in hand on the New York Islanders and Florida, two of the teams they’re chasing.

But the Penguins must win those games in hand. That’s possible, but their performance lately suggests otherwise. Especially with No. 1 goalie Tristan Jarry returning to save the day but stinking to high heaven in his two games back.

We’re told Jarry needs time to find his form. But the Penguins don’t have time.

Sure, this is the same group that went 12-1-1 from Nov. 17 to Dec. 15. It’s also the same group that has had seven-, six- and now four-game losing streaks.

The Penguins’ sins are easily ciphered: goaltending troubles. The NHL’s worst bottom six. A defensive corps that’s a bad match for the style pursued. An underachieving power play. An inconsistent penalty kill. Salary cap problems that prevent trades, call-ups and, currently, the activation of “injured” defenseman Jan Rutta. (Winger Kasperi Kapanen got waived Friday. If he isn’t claimed, the Penguins still won’t have enough cap space to activate Rutta.)

GM Ron Hextall has done horribly.

The crowd at PPG Paints Arena noticed, chanting “Fire Hextall!” on Thursday. If that’s not a first, I don’t remember what was.

Hextall buried the Penguins with the contracts given Rutta, Kapanen and Jeff Carter, the trade made for Jeff Petry and by not upgrading their goalies.

Washington, like the Penguins, is a recent champ. The Capitals won the Stanley Cup in 2018, the Penguins in ’16 and ’17.

The Capitals are one point behind the Penguins. But the Capitals are sellers.

On Thursday, the Capitals traded top-four defenseman Dimitry Orlov and big bottom-six forward Garnet Hathaway to Boston. Washington got first-, second- and third-round draft picks and forward Craig Smith. Orlov and Hathaway are rentals.

The Capitals realize that even if they get a wild-card spot, they get throttled in the first round by Boston or Carolina. So they’re thinking big picture.

The Penguins need to realize the same and do the same. If Alex Ovechkin can accept it, so can Sidney Crosby, Kris Letang and Evgeni Malkin. (Ovechkin mostly is concerned with chasing Wayne Gretzky’s record for goals, anyway.)

The Penguins should trade winger Jason Zucker and defenseman Brian Dumoulin. Both are pending free agents.

There’s no complaint to be had with either. Zucker is a legit top-six who plays with his heart on his sleeve. Dumoulin hasn’t been the same since injury and surgery, but he has been better lately and has two Stanley Cup rings’ worth of experience.

Zucker might fetch a second-round pick, Dumoulin a fourth-rounder.

Deal with reality, not long-shot fantasy.

Edmonton should have driven that home Thursday.

The Penguins want to play fast hockey, but too many teams are so much faster. Edmonton and New Jersey look like they’re skating rings around the Penguins.

The Penguins love their style, clinging to it doggedly. It used to work. The Penguins used to be faster and better.

Even after Thursday’s debacle, coach Mike Sullivan cited the need to “play fast” in the NHL. That may be true, but the Penguins simply can’t do it. Nor, besides Letang, do they have the right defensive corps to constantly pinch and activate. They no longer have Trevor Daleys and Justin Schultzes.

You want that bottom six to run-and-gun?

Carter is 38 and decrepit. He can’t run.

Brock McGinn has no points in 24 games. Teddy Blueger has one goal in 31 games. Kapanen had one goal in 15 games before he got waived. Those three must have misplaced their guns. Players like that don’t have to score a lot. But they can’t not score at all.

None of the Penguins’ unproductive bottom-six forwards has the non-stats impact of, say, Carl Hagelin, who bedeviled foes with his frantic forecheck.

The Penguins aren’t who they used to be or who they want to be. If they don’t quickly understand who they are, problems will multiply.