It’s weird, really, that we’re sitting here seven hours ahead of a playoff game, wondering whether Penguins coach Mike Sullivan is wise to start his starting goaltender.
It’s also a testament to how good Marc-Andre Fleury had been, in aggregate, during the 2017 Stanley Cup playoffs. Save for a couple squishy moments against Columbus — nobody can be 100 percent great, 100 percent of the time — Fleury’s play had been bulletproof until Game 3 against the Senators. The Penguins are still playing because of him.
Now, they’ll play without him. Matt Murray, dealing with a groin injury since he warmed up for Game 1 of the postseason, is taking Fleury’s place in the wake of his first-period meltdown on Wednesday.
"Marc was a professional like he always is,” Sullivan told reporters after announcing the decision, saying that the decision was good and difficult because the pair is “as capable as they are.” He wouldn’t elaborate much beyond that.
It’s a cold profession, goaltending; Fleury was throwing up a .931 save percentage in the very, very recent past. But if you think the Penguins’ margin for error is nil — and it’s close enough, given the way the series has unfolded — and if you pretend for a second that Marc-Andre Fleury were, in terms of his personality, somebody else, Sullivan’s decision makes sense.
Fleury has started the Penguins’ last 15 games. Like Dave Lozo noted at Vice Sports, he hasn’t played that much that consistently since a 23-game stretch in 2011-12. That, coupled with how much work Fleury had to do in the first two rounds, makes him a prime candidate for burn-out — and he certainly looked the part in Game 3.
Sticking with Fleury over Murray — the guy who won a Stanley Cup last June, then outperformed Fleury .923 to .909 during the regular season — would be predicated on two things. One, that he’s the hot hand, isn’t true anymore. He’d been better than he’d ever been before. Unsustainably so, in fact. That ended a couple days ago.
Maybe he needed a day off. Maybe he’d turned back into a pumpkin. This is not the time to figure it out.
The other is that the switch would do real damage to the psyche of the team at large. There’s something to be said for that — Marc-Andre Fleury is a legendarily nice guy. He’s beloved by all. You hear it ad nauseam because it’s true. That only takes you so far, though; Murray doesn’t quite spend his off days torturing his teammates’ pets. He also won them a Cup a year ago. They know that.
So, maybe Sullivan thinks Fleury is gassed. He’s got reason to believe it. Maybe he thinks the guy that has been demonstrably better than Fleury since the moment he left Wilkes-Barre is healthy enough to do the job. He’s got reason to believe that, too.
Maybe the most positive way to think of it all — the best way, if you’re a Penguins fan — is as Sullivan showing his team that their effort in Game 3 wasn’t good enough. It’s time to get desperate. This was the biggest button available to the coach, and we’re about to find out whether he pushed it at the right time. He’s been right before.
Sean Gentille: sgentille@post-gazette.com, Twitter @seangentille.
First Published: May 19, 2017, 4:42 p.m.