By JUSTIN GUERRIERO

The Tribune-Review, Greensburg

(TNS)—Over their recent four-game winning streak, which tied a season-best but ended Tuesday, the Pittsburgh Penguins stacked together victories in spite of their penalty kill.

Once a stronger element of the team’s game, of late it’s been a liability, with the Penguins sporting a 65% kill rate (15 of 23) through nine games this month.

“The last, probably, 15 games or so it hasn’t been nearly as good as it was for most of the year,” said coach Mike Sullivan, whose team will host Columbus on Friday. “It was a top-10 kill for most of the year, and the last 15-plus games, I don’t think it’s been nearly as good. There’s a lot of reasons for that.”

The Penguins posted an 85.7% (30 for 35) kill rate in October and killed off 76.1% (32 of 42) power-pay tries in November, followed by an 84.3% kill rate (27 of 32) in December.

However, the turn of the calendar to 2025 has brought a reversal in fortunes.

In January, the penalty kill was 26 for 37 (70.2%).

While it rebounded to 81.3% (13 of 16) in the abbreviated month of February (because of the 4 Nations Face-Off break), it’s reached a new low in late March.

Granted, the Penguins’ streak-snapping defeat to the Islanders on Tuesday was the first time in four games the penalty kill didn’t let up a goal (although New York only had one power-play try).

Part of the problem has undoubtedly been a revolving door of personnel on the penalty kill, necessitated in large part because of the in-season trades orchestrated by president of hockey operations/general manager Kyle Dubas.

Lars Eller (traded to Washington on Nov. 12) plus Marcus Pettersson and Drew O’Connor (sent to Vancouver on Jan. 31) all saw heavy short-handed minutes with the Penguins.

The same could be said of Jack St. Ivany, who’s been with Wilkes-Barre/Scranton of the American Hockey League since late November, and Matt Nieto, who was waived in late February (Nieto is currently back with the Penguins under emergency roster conditions).

While noting the ongoing challenge of getting new faces acclimated to the penalty kill, Sullivan was far from ready to write off that unit’s struggles because of fluctuating personnel.

“A lot of it boils down to details: recognition skills, awareness skills, collective effort, working together, understanding what the concepts are and then going out and executing,” Sullivan said.

“I’m sure the fact that we’ve moved a lot of bodies in there with new guys is part of it — just trying to get new guys assimilated into that group and giving them the opportunity to gain a better understanding of how we’re trying to kill. … But a lot of it just boils down to details and the reads in-zone.”

A particular area of emphasis is making opponents’ zone entries more difficult.

Doing so entails putting more pressure on the puck carrier, having a stingier, harassing presence in the neutral zone and being able to match the speed of a power-play unit advancing past the offensive blue line.

“If we can get them under pressure and you don’t let teams set up, you have a lot more success,” said defenseman Ryan Graves, who leads active

Winslow Townson/ Getty Images/TNS Penguins defensemen with 1 minute, 52 seconds of short-handed time per game.

“If you’re able to get them on the run, it’s better to make a team make a few plays through you under pressure than it is to have them set up, handle (the puck) and feed it over to their one-timer guy. You want to keep them under pressure and out of their setup.”

Added forward Bryan Rust: “They have an extra guy, obviously, so they’re going to be able to get (in the zone) a fair amount of the time, but our objective is when they do get it in, continue to put pressure on them so they can’t be comfortable and set up.”

Ultimately, zone entries represent only a piece of the puzzle.

“I don’t think it’s any one or two things,” Sullivan said. “I think it’s a number of things that at the end of the day boil down to attention to detail, recognition skills and awareness skills.

That’s such an important aspect of penalty-killing.”

Notes: Injured defensemen P.O Joseph and Ryan Shea plus forward Tommy Novak all skated individually ahead of Thursday’s practice in Cranberry. Of the three, Joseph (weekto- week, undisclosed ailment) is the only one designated to injured reserve. He last played March 1 against the Boston Bruins before being forced to leave the game. For Novak, Thursday marked the first time he was able to skate after suffering an unspecified injury that has sidelined him since March 9. Shea (suspected left arm injury), has missed the Penguins’ last four games.