Penguins play 'most complete game' in win over Flyers, Sullivan says
The Pittsburgh Penguins are rounding into form. Their head coach thinks so, at least.
After a big 4-1 win over the Flyers in Philadelphia on Saturday, Mike Sullivan called his team's effort "the most complete game we've had," according to NHL.com's Adam Kimelman.
"I thought when the time came to have to defend, we defended hard. Our attention to detail was really good," Sullivan said. "I thought everybody trusted one another out there. And when we play that way, we're hard to play against. This was obviously an important game for both teams; we're playing against a very good team that's won a lot of games recently."
With the win, the Penguins jumped the New York Islanders in the Metropolitan Division, knocking the Brooklynites into the first wild-card spot in the Eastern Conference. The Isles are in action Saturday in Dallas, so could hop the Penguins with a win.
More importantly for the Penguins, they moved six points up on the Flyers, though Philadelphia has a game in hand.
Sullivan's Penguins are 24-14 since he took over as head coach, and he signaled out Phil Kessel after the game, who made a key play on a forecheck that led to what ended up being the game-winning goal.
"I thought that was a big part of the game, and when Phil engages like that down low, he's a big body," Sullivan said. "He's strong. And when he engages like that, he's hard to play against. I thought he made the whole play. I mean, it was a terrific play all around, but I thought Phil made the whole play as far as creating that turnover. And that's what we need more of from everybody for us to be the type of team that we want to become.
"I've said this from day one since I've taken this team over that we have to be a team that can generate offense different ways. We have some talented players that I think can create off the rush with their instinctive play and their sheer talent. And when we add that other element to our game and we create offense off of our puck pursuit and end zone, just relentless pursuit on the puck, I think we're a harder team to play against."