There haven't been many positive general trends regarding your favorite hockey team over the past two, three years.

But if there's one that I would highlight more than any other, it's that they do a lot better when they're at least a little

bit scared. Good morning to you. Good Tuesday morning. I'm Day on Kovachovich of D.K. Pittsburgh

Sports. This is Daily Shot of Penguins. It comes your way right and early every weekday. If you're

into football and or baseball, I also offer daily shots of Steelers and Pirates in the same place

that you found this. The Penguins are taking on the Panthers tonight at PPG Paints

Arena. That's a 7.08 p.m. face-off. It's a matchup of two teams that have won three games in a row,

and that's where the similarities end, as in all

of the similarities end. As in the other guys are Stanley Cup champions, and your guys

really, really, really, really struggled before their little three-game streak.

Now, if I'm Mike Sullivan, his coaching staff, I'm setting this one up by just showing

Alexander Barkov, Matthew Kachuk, Sam Reinhart, highlights galore. Most of those from their best of seven victory over the Oilers this

past summer. I'm showing them the damage that those guys can do. I'm showing them how together

that team became and undoubtedly remains. They've been playing a little bit

better of late after the obligatory, you know, post-cup withdrawal syndromes that we

remember from when that was the sort of thing that was happening here. And I'm making the

Panthers sound, you know, outright frightening because they can be.

They just played the Hurricanes. That's their most recent game over the weekend and beat them

six to nothing. The Hurricanes, who, you know, kind of own the local team, six to nothing.

And the reason that I'm doing that is it takes a lot, a lot to impress upon the penguin's main guys,

not just the supporting cast whom I'm always picking on, the main guys, that this is going to be hard.

And you've got to do things outside your regular comfort zone just to stay in the game, let alone prevail.

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