PROSPECTS CHALLENGE NOTEBOOK – SEPT. 16 vs. BUFFALO

BUFFALO, N.Y. – The Pittsburgh Penguins prospects are champions once again.

Thanks to an 8-5 win over the Buffalo Sabres in the final game of the 2024 Prospects Challenge, the Penguins finished with an undefeated, 3-0 record, defending their championship won at last year’s event.

Avery Hayes scored a hat trick and had four points on Monday, and Tristan Broz followed suit with a four-point game of his own. Hayes provided an offensive spark at key moments in the game, putting his team in the driver’s seat and never letting off the gas.

“The puck was bouncing my way a couple of times, and I’m playing with great players,” Hayes said. “I mean, we have a bunch of guys who have a chance to make the NHL this year. It’s easy playing with them, and I had a blast.”

Buffalo cashed in on the power play to seize its first lead of the game, with Viktor Neuchev letting loose from the slot midway through the first period. Five minutes later, Jiří Kulich also buried one from the slot, making it 2-0.

However, the Penguins pulled within one with 2:20 left before the first intermission. Broz fed Hayes on a two-on-one rush for the latter’s third goal of the tournament.

Hayes didn’t have to wait long after the intermission to earn his fourth and fifth goals and complete the hat trick. He tied the game, 2-2, with a tip in on a carryover power play 46 seconds into the middle frame, and then he gave the Penguins the 3-2 lead two minutes and 12 seconds later.

“I thought he was outstanding and it’s good to see guys get rewarded for hard work,” said Wilkes-Barre/Scranton head coach Kirk MacDonald. “His energy level, his compete, has been outstanding.

“Going back to Saturday’s game, he deserved that empty netter for his play. It’s nice to see a guy rewarded with an empty-net goal. You can say, ‘Hey, you’ve done a lot of great things and had a lot of really good looks.’ Now tonight, he got rewarded even more.”

Not happy to see Hayes have all the fun, Kulich netted his second man-advantage marker of the night at 4:43 of the second, making it 3-3.

Ville Koivunen delivered a top-corner snipe while the teams were skating at four-on-four at 11:56 to put his team back on top. Then Mathieu De St. Phalle buried one for a two-goal lead with 3:29 remaining in the second stanza.

Twenty-two seconds into the third period, Neuchev secured his second goal of the game, but the Penguins were unfazed. Koivunen and Broz connected once again during four-on-four, this time with Broz lighting the lamp. That tally, which gave Broz his fourth point of the night, put Pittsburgh up 6-4.

The Penguins’ Logan Pietila and the Sabres’ Anton Wahlberg exchanged goals 75 seconds apart, and eventually Rutger McGroarty slammed in the game’s final goal to round out the scoring at 8-5.

It was a successful title defense for Pittsburgh, albeit with a new cast of characters, and gives many of these young players something to build upon going into training camp.

“Even though it doesn’t count towards anything, everyone in [the Penguins’ locker room] takes it really seriously,” Hayes said. “It’s our first time to show everyone in the organization what we’ve been working all last year and throughout the summer. So it’s an awesome opportunity for us, and we didn’t take it lightly. I thought we played well today, and the whole week.”

FINER DETAILS:

• His stats were a tad overshadowed by Hayes’ hat trick, but Broz’s performance on Monday should not be overlooked. He registered a goal and three assists on Monday, his second multi-point game of the Prospects Challenge. In three games, the 21-year-old notched three goals and four assists for seven points.

MacDonald praised Broz’s offensive ability after the team’s win on Friday and again on Monday, but then took his praise in another direction.

“Honestly, the one thing I was thinking about was how hard he backchecked,” MacDonald said with a wide grin. “When guys that are your skilled guys are doing that, it forces everybody else to do that. Nobody has a choice, right? The whole group has to do it. The points are great, yeah, but if these guys want to play in the National League, that’s the stuff you have to do.”

• Taylor Gauthier was replaced by Sergei Murashov midway through the second period, just like in Friday’s tournament-opening win. This time, Gauthier left having made 15 saves on 18 shots faced. Murashov turned away 14 of 16 shots in relief.

• The Penguins allowed just 35 shots combined in their first two games. On Monday, the Sabres had 34 shots.

While it seems like that may be the team’s defense springing a leak, MacDonald lauded his team’s play afterwards, noting that Buffalo was “the most skilled team they had played” during the week.

• McGroarty gave a big fist pump after his goal with 90 seconds left in the game. It was a raw release of emotion for the 20-year-old prospect, who was snakebitten for most of the game. He was set up on the doorstep a handful of times, only to be stonewalled by the Sabres’ goalies. It wasn’t until a backhand pass by Hayes that McGroarty found the back of the net with an authoritative finish to precede that animated fist pump.