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In Sweden, the place where it all started for Dan Muse as Penguins' head coach, he will look to get his team back on track. Joe Sargent / NHLI via Getty Images
STOCKHOLM — Kyle Dubas walked briskly out of Avicii Arena on Saturday afternoon following Penguins practice. Walking side by side with him was Dan Muse, the man he hired six months earlier to guide his team.
As the surprising Penguins reach what could be a very pivotal stretch of schedule, it’s only fitting that they’re in Stockholm and that Dubas and Muse were walking stride by stride together. This is, after all, where it all started.
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Muse’s Penguins knocked the hockey world on its collective backside with a spectacular October, something most pundits and fans alike were not expecting. There’s been far more talk about the Penguins making their way back to the postseason than there has been about the Gavin McKenna sweepstakes.
However, in the past couple of weeks, that feel-good start to the season has endured some blows. The Penguins are 1-3-2 in their past six games, have blown 3-0 leads in two of those games, blown leads of some type in five consecutive games and suddenly have lost some of the momentum from that glorious start.
Their head coach received a considerable amount of praise for the Penguins’ start. He’s now in the spotlight as he attempts to guide his team out of its first slump on his watch.
His players maintain he hasn’t blinked.
“He’s got a stern side when needed,” Blake Lizotte said. “But he’s relational. He isn’t going to scream at you until you’re blue in the face. He isn’t like that. He’s just consistent, doesn’t waver.”
The Penguins will have an opportunity to turn the tide of their losing streak when they play the Predators at 9 a.m. ET in Stockholm on Sunday.
Indeed, the roots of Muse’s coaching reign started to grow six months ago in this very city.
Back in May, Dubas was the general manager of Team Canada in the IIHF World Championship. That tournament took place in Stockholm. While Dubas was representing Team Canada at that tournament, his days were largely spent conducting Zoom interviews for the Penguins coaching vacancy.
Dubas joked back then that he loves the early morning hours in Stockholm because Sweden is six hours ahead of the Eastern Time Zone. Therefore, Dubas said, he enjoyed peace and quiet in the early hours, his phone not continually buzzing, because most everyone in the National Hockey League who blows up his phone daily was asleep.
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This gave Dubas time to ponder the right person for the job. And in those early morning hours, his thoughts kept returning to Muse, who ultimately won him over.
Dubas was convinced that he had the right man to guide the Penguins and now Muse’s first real test starts in Sweden. So far, it’s been something of a dream season for the new coach, but adversity always comes. If the Penguins lose again to the Predators on Sunday, they’ll be in danger heading down the standings in the exceedingly tight Eastern Conference. They’ll have lost two straight games against one of the NHL’s worst teams. And they’re only a couple of weeks away from facing their most difficult schedule stretch of the season.
They’re also dealing with a growing list of injuries.
Muse, though, can get the Penguins back on track with what feels like a much-needed win.
The Penguins seem to be betting on their coach.
“He’s a great communicator,” Connor Dewar said. “We know we haven’t played our best recently, but his message to us has been to remember who we are. He had a great training camp for us, detailed. It showed us who we are then. We have to get back to that.”
While the Penguins talk about Muse’s consistent disposition, there was a different tone after Friday’s loss to Nashville.
“I think everyone knows that we should have won some of the games that we lost during the last couple of weeks,” Ryan Shea said. “But I think we also realize that what happened (on Friday night) wasn’t good. We were barely in that game, even though we were winning.”
Thus, it was a different Muse who emerged at practice on Saturday.
“We saw a different kind of fire out of him today,” Shea said. “We know we didn’t play the way we are capable of.”
Muse is dealing with a handful of injuries. He also has an interesting goaltending decision on Sunday, as he could run with the hot hand in Artūrs Šilovs or go with rookie Sergei Murashov. Then there’s the power play that suddenly looks sluggish, the top line that has struggled in recent games, the second line trying to replace the injured Justin Brazeau, the fourth line trying to replace the injured Noel Acciari, not to mention a handful of other issues, like figuring out what’s best: 18-year-old Ben Kindel and 19-year-old Harrison Brunicke.
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Muse’s plate is very full.
“But he hasn’t changed,” Sidney Crosby said. “Win or lose, you try to evaluate it for what it is.”
From Crosby on down, this is a locker room that is very much impressed with its first-year head coach.
Given the start that the Penguins have enjoyed, this has the potential to be a dream season. Making the playoffs would be a remarkable accomplishment for this group.
Even if it’s only November, losing two consecutive games to the Predators would be a problem. The continuation of this losing streak would be an option.
It’s up to Muse to figure out some answers.
“We believe in this guy,” Lizotte said. “We believe in what started in camp. It’s time to start playing better.”
Practice notes
• Ville Koivunen, the struggling Penguins’ forward who has just two points in 11 games, left practice early on Saturday with an apparent injury and did not return. Muse offered no update on his condition.
• The Penguins assigned forward Rutger McGroarty and goaltender Joel Blomqvist, both of whom have been dealing with injuries, to Wilkes-Barre in the American Hockey League. While Blomqvist figures to stay there for the duration of the season unless injuries arise to the Penguins’ goaltenders, it would seem to be only a matter of time until McGroarty makes his way to Pittsburgh.
• A large crowd watched the Penguins practice for about 45 minutes in Stockholm on Saturday afternoon.
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Josh Yohe is a senior writer for The Athletic covering the Pittsburgh Penguins. Josh joined The Athletic in 2017 after covering the Penguins for a decade, first for the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review and then for DKPittsburghSports.com. Follow Josh on Twitter @JoshYohe_PGH
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