Penguins Embarassed by Maple Leafs

Last night, with the Penguins looking to get back on a winning run after spanking the Atlanta Thrashers on Thursday, they welcomed the below-average Toronto Maple Leafs into their own barn.

Unfortunately, it wouldn't have mattered if they hosted the Toronto Marlies of the AHL.

The Maple Leafs embarassed the Penguins on their home ice, 7-3 last night.

The Penguins were outshot, 40-23 and played one of their worst defensive games of the season.

Marc-Andre Fleury also crashed backwards last night, giving up 5 goals in the first 2 periods before being removed in favor of Dany Sabourin. And saying Fleury was bad is probably being charitable. He wasn't anywhere near the way he played on Thursday against the Thrashers.

The closest the Penguins ever got to Toronto was 3-1, and they probably didn't deserve to be that close. Toronto brought their lunch pails and both outworked and outskated the Penguins all night.

As an illustration of how bad things were for Pittsburgh, look no further than Maple Leafs coach Ron Wilson, who characterized his team's play after the win as "easily, our best game of the season".

Sorry. That shouldn't happen against the Penguins.

For the record, Evgeni Malkin and Petr Sykora (2) scored for the flightless birds. I'm not surew here everyone else was.

Pittsburgh is definitely in a funk. Despite their 17-11-4 record, they sit precariously on the edge of playoff position in the Eastern Conference -- 7th, and have even sunk to 4th in their own division. They haven't won consecutive games in regualtion time in about 6 weeks, and haven't prevailed in 2 games in a row of any kind in about a month.

Most teams go through some stretch like this each year, although the Penguins have done a good job of avoiding these periods in each of the last 2 seasons. They have time to get back on track, but don't want to burn up the cushion they'd like to have down the stretch of the season. If they keep playing the way they are -- not working as hard as they can, and not being as sharp defensively as they need to -- they could very well require a good winning streak down the stretch of the season just to qualify for the playoffs. Let's hope things don't get to that point.

We'll see how the Boys come out for their next game, against the Sabres on Monday in Buffalo.