Penguins announce their starting goaltender for the playoffs.

Penguins name their starter.

HockeyFeed
HockeyFeed
Published 3 years ago
Penguins announce their starting goaltender for the playoffs.

The Pittsburgh Penguins have made their choice and so far I think it is safe to say that the reaction has been mixed. 

First, according to an official announcement from the Penguins organization veteran goaltender Matt Murray will get the start for Game 1 of the Penguins opening round series against the Montreal Canadiens. There has been a done of debate since the start of training camp regarding which of the Penguins two goaltenders, the aforementioned Matt Murray and Tristan Jarry, would get the start but this puts an end that debate. The question now of course is how will this work out for Penguins head coach Mike Sullivan, the man no doubt with the final say on this decision, and how the Penguins fan base will react to Murray going in for Game 1.

The has been a vocal portion of the Penguins fan base calling for Jarry to get his shot after some of the struggles that Matt Murray has had since winning 2 Stanley Cup Championships for the organization, and those fans made themselves known after this announcement. Here are just a few examples of the negative responses to today's news from the Penguins:

You can see why, given Murrays history in the playoffs, Mike Sullivan and the Penguins would chose to go with the proven commodity in these incredibly important games, but you can also understand the frustration from fans who saw Jarry outperform Murray during the regular season. Although the regular season was months ago now, Murray posted a 2.87 goals against average and an .899 save percentage over 38 games for the Penguins. In the playoffs those kind of numbers mean you are simply going to be going home. Meanwhile Jarry was outstanding with a 2.43 goals against average and a much improved .921 save percentage over the 33 appearances he made for the Penguins during the season. Again these numbers were relative to the performance of each goalie months ago now, but you can see why recency bias would have people siding with Jarry coming into this series. 

At the end of the day though the Penguins have made their decision, and no amount of discussion is going to change who starts for Game 1 now.

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