‘Nobody’s happy about it right now’ as the Penguins move on without Jake Guentzel
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Kyle Dubas justified.
Evgeni Malkin apologized.
Michael Bunting acclimated.
And Jake Guentzel was gone.
Friday was hardly an upbeat day for the Pittsburgh Penguins as the NHL’s trade deadline came and went. But it was an occasion that provided some clarity as to what direction the Penguins will take for the remainder of the season and beyond.
Guentzel, defensemen Chad Ruhwedel and Ty Smith as well as reserve goaltender Magnus Hellberg were traded away from a team that has roundly disappointed this season.
In return, the Penguins got back a bunch of perfectly adequate — but hardly spectacular — prospects and several draft picks with varying conditions attached.
Entering Friday, the Penguins sat in sixth place of the Metropolitan Division with a 28-25-8 record and 64 points. By every measure, they have fallen well below what were grand aspirations of a return to glory for the franchise after Dubas took over as president of hockey operations this past offseason.
The moves Dubas made going into the deadline were primarily geared toward enhancing the Penguins’ fortunes beyond this season.
“We need to make a lot of improvement to the group,” Dubas said. “Obviously, we’re not where we aspire to be without the salary-cap flexibility to do it. … We’re going to go into the summer now with about $12 million in cap space to improve on certain slots.”
One area of immediate improvement came in the form of Bunting, whom the Penguins acquired from the Carolina Hurricanes as part of a bundle of assets for Guentzel and Smith.
A steady top-six winger, Bunting has appeared in 60 games this season and has scored 36 points (13 goals, 23 assists) while averaging 15 minutes, 7 seconds of ice time per contest.
“I’m excited to go where I’m wanted, and I’m excited to be a Pittsburgh Penguin,” said Bunting, who flew in early Friday morning. “This franchise has a lot of history and knows how to win. I have two more years on my contract, and I’m excited to come back and continue my career as a Penguin.”
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Seemingly, any addition could benefit the Penguins at the moment, especially after a humiliating 6-0 home loss to the Washington Capitals on Thursday.
Malkin, a steward of the Penguins for 18 seasons, offered a mea culpa regarding the defeat.
“Last night, we all understand it’s not a great night for us,” Malkin said after practice Friday in Cranberry. “I want to say sorry to fans because they pay (for) tickets, they come to (the) rink and they see this game. It’s not great. We can (lose), but we need to play harder for sure.”
That pledge to play harder will not involve the talents of Guentzel and Ruhwedel, the only two members of the NHL roster who were jettisoned.
Players were getting dressed for practice as Ruhwedel was pulled aside and informed he had been traded to the New York Rangers in exchange for a fourth-round pick in 2027.
Guentzel and Ruhwedel were among the few remaining members of the franchise’s most recent Stanley Cup title in 2017 and were highly popular among teammates.
“Nobody’s happy about it right now,” Dubas said. “And I wouldn’t want it any other way. I wouldn’t want them ever to be happy with those things. So that’s part of this job, and it’s part of their job to be upset when those things happen.”
The Guentzel trade happened in part because Dubas and Guentzel’s agent, Ben Hankinson, never reached an agreement on a potential contract extension.
In the final year of a five-year contract with a salary cap hit of $6 million, Guentzel had expressed hope of remaining with the Penguins.
Dubas indicated the Penguins discussed an extension this past offseason, but nothing truly materialized from those talks once the season began.
“I think Jake deserves all that he gets,” Dubas said. “So if there’s any blame to go on that, I would take it myself. But I viewed it at that point as, once we got to a certain level, that we had to then go through the year and see the way that the year went.”
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“I don’t expect people to agree with it. He’s a very popular player in the room, in the community. I think in this position, you have to make these types of decisions, knowing that they’re not going to be popular to anybody, and that’s part of the job.”
As far as the prospects the Penguins received from the Hurricanes — forwards Ville Koivunen, Vasily Ponomarev and Cruz Lucius — none were considered the best of that organization’s pool of future assets. Dubas acknowledged that assessment but also suggested that was the reality of dealing away “rentals” — i.e. players with expiring contracts — such as Guentzel.
“Making trades of this nature, if you’re going to acquire some of these what they would rate as their own No. 1 or No. 2 prospects, those generally come with players with longer term on their deals, not rentals,” Dubas said. “Koivunen was one of the players that we had targeted just in our evaluations and our internal way that we go through our scouting process and our process of evaluating guys. He was one of the players that was in that mix.”
Dubas repeatedly lauded Koivunen. A 20-year-old, he entered Friday as the sixth-leading scorer of the Liiga, the top professional league in his native Finland. In 57 games this season, the left-hander has 55 points (21 goals, 34 assists).
“He’s had an excellent year,” Dubas said. “He was a guy that when we got to the 2021 draft when I was in Toronto, we had highly touted in our process year going through this. He was one of their players we had targeted very highly, and he’s had a great year with Karpat.
“He’s just gotten better and better as the year’s gone on. He makes such a high impact, highly competitive and highly skilled, which seems to be the mix that fits here best.”
Dubas indicated Ponomarev will be assigned to Wilkes-Barre/Scranton of the AHL and could be recalled to the NHL roster before the conclusion of the regular season. He is expected to challenge for a roster spot to open next season.
As for Lucius, he is in his sophomore season at the NCAA level with Wisconsin and is expected to remain there going into next season.
The draft picks the Penguins acquired from Carolina call for considerable success by the Hurricanes for the conditions to be enacted.
The Penguins will receive the Hurricanes’ 2024 first-round selection, only if Carolina reaches the Stanley Cup Final this spring. Otherwise, they will receive the Philadelphia Flyers’ second-round pick in this year’s draft that was previously acquired by the Hurricanes.
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Dubas explained the minimal difference between the Hurricanes first-round pick — which would be no better than No. 31 overall if they reach the final — and the Flyers’ second-rounder — projected to be in the mid-50s among overall selections — was a spectrum they were comfortable accepting.
Additionally, they will receive a fifth-round pick in 2024 only if the Hurricanes win the Stanley Cup this season.
“On the initial pick … our view of it was, the way if you look at the standings now, the way it projects out, we can lock in that positioning by going from their first to Philly’s second, which they owned from a previous trade,” Dubas said. “And then, the additional pick was just at the very end to throw it over the top on their end with an additional prospect.”
Just before the 3 p.m. deadline, Hellberg, a reserve goaltender, was traded to the Florida Panthers in exchange for another journeyman goaltender, Ludovic Waeber, and a conditional seventh-round draft pick in 2025.
Per Cap Friendly, the Penguins currently have $850,000 of salary cap space and 47 players under contract for the remainder of the season, three short of the league limit of 50.
When the Penguins take the ice for a road game Saturday against the Boston Bruins, they will look different.
There really was no other choice.
“You still have to make the decisions that you think are best for the group regardless of how they’re perceived,” Dubas said. “And do what’s right for the Penguins.”