No, not really. Maybe those who only count W’s and L’s, but anyone watching this team, knows what they are watching, and how it was very lucky to avoid a series upset, let alone a game 7, isn’t any more relieved.

Until this team gets with the program and everyone plays an overall game that can win without the individual efforts of its stars, then it’s only going to get harder to breath as they go deeper.

This team needs to forecheck better, get more turnovers, take way center ice more, and keep the play in front of them and on the other side of the ice as much as possible. Bylsma needs only to show video of Game 1 of the Pens/Sens series in ’08 to illustrate how this team needs to play. I remember the intensity the Pens showed from the drop of the puck that told me that team was going to be very hard to beat. I remember the first hit of the game by Crosby of all people, that told the rest of the team had to match that intensity from that moment on.

I’d like to see that kinda proverbial “punch in the mouth” by the Penguins from the get go this time as well, followed by a continuing beat down in all facets of the game from there on out. This team has the capabilities, it just has to wake up, decide to do it, and get it done. Once they stop playing like superstars and start playing like super hockey players, all else will fall in line.

On talent alone this team can get high marks right across the board, but like the smart kids who fail to make anything of their natural gifts in school, they fail in comparison to the less than intelligent students who study harder and make more of their limited options.

This team underachives more than any other in the league and in hockey, usually the teams that want it more and work for it the most are the ones that move on.

My concern is that this team’s overall group of defensemen is just not good enough for them to win the Cup. I sure hope that’s not true.

1. Letang is not a great defenseman from the true definition of what a defenseman is and should be foremost. His defensive play is shoddy at best and he’s a turnover machine with bad puck management habits. Him trying to hold onto the puck at the blue-line is almost comical. If it’s all about points then this award is a joke. At the minimum; a Norris candidate should at least be a good defenseman first regardless of any offensive upside. It’s like awarding the best driver of the year award to a person who ran over 3 people but never got a speeding ticket. If he had no offensive skills he wouldn’t even be playing. The fact he’s never been a finalist is telling and that he is now even more so, as it confirms the lack of any real good candidates out there aside from Suter, Chara and the previous cry-baby winner with the bad achilles, who in a defensive role, I’d rather have than Letang.

2. The Pens had the same lapses in defensive play for the prior three playoff seasons WITH Orpik in the lineup, so how does him being out so far make his absence important? Orpik is not the answer to what ails this defense and I’ll be stunned if his limp-wristed, backpedaling, stick waving, lack of gap control skills can fend off an aggressive forecheck with the Pens forwards chasing from behind any better than how they are doing it now. It’s not so much a problem with the defenseman in general, but like always it seems, the way the entire team approaches it’s defensive responsibilities as a whole. Orpik key to their struggles? Please.