Blake Lizotte was back in full on Tuesday, and that put the Pittsburgh Penguins on track for the one thing they care about most right now: getting through practice and into Game 1 healthy.
The Penguins are set to open the NHL regular season Wednesday in Philadelphia, and Lizotte’s return gave coach Dan Muse a cleaner picture of his lineup. It still looks a lot like the group that dressed in Buffalo on Saturday, but there were enough tweaks to matter.
Some of that came from injuries. Some of it came from Lizotte being available again.
And some of it could open a little more ice for a player who hasn’t had much of it before.
That player is Filip Hallander.
With Lizotte back in his usual fourth-line role, Muse bumped Hallander up to the third line, where he’ll skate with Hendrix Lapierre and Ville Koivunen instead of Connor Dewar and Elmer Soderblom.
“Same game,” Hallander quipped to PHN.
Same game, sure. But not the same look.
Hallander, 26, has appeared in 16 NHL games, including 13 last season before blood clot issues and related complications ended his year. He has four points in his NHL career, with one goal among them. Before coming back to North America last season, though, he was piling up numbers in Sweden, where he scored 26 goals in 2024-25 for Timra IK of the Swedish High League.
Koivunen is in the lineup as well, avoiding what would have been an awkward move after the team signed him to an eight-year deal in the offseason. Lapierre has already given the Penguins encouraging early returns, and his spot opened up in part because Ben Kindel is dealing with a week-to-week lower body injury.
Here’s how the Penguins line up as they head toward the opener:
Nick Robertson-Sidney Crosby-Rickard Rakell
Egor Chinakhov-Tommy Novak-Evgeni Malkin
Filip Hallander-Hendrix Lapierre-Ville Koivunen
Connor Dewar-Blake Lizotte-Elmer Soderblom
On defense, it’s Declan Carlile with Erik Karlsson, Trevor van Riemsdyk with Kris Letang, and Sam Girard with Kaedan Korczak.
In goal, the Penguins list Arturs Silovs and Sergei Murashov, with Rutger McGroarty, David Gustafsson and Ilya Solovyov as extras.
Lizotte’s return was the biggest checkpoint of the day. He came back to practice exactly when expected, and general manager Kyle Dubas had already indicated Monday that Tuesday’s session would determine whether he was ready for Wednesday. By all accounts, including his own and Muse’s, it went smoothly.
“He was a full participant today in practice. You know, he looked good,” Muse said. “I still have to run things up there with the training staff, and that’s kind of the process.”
The expectation is that Lizotte will play Tuesday night when the Penguins visit the Philadelphia Flyers at Comcast Arena, the building where their 2025-26 season ended in Game 6 of their Round One series last May.
For all the tinkering, though, the Penguins are still carrying a lot of the same pieces into this season. Muse warned not to read too much into the first camp lineup, but the numbers tell their own story: 16 players are back from last season, and 14 of them are expected to dress for Game 1. That gives Muse a level of continuity most teams don’t get when they’re trying to turn the page.
And around the room, there’s a different feel to it this time.
Hope is always part of opening night, but the Penguins sounded more confident than they did a year ago. As one player put it, “the new players, they’re not worse.”
Muse sees the same energy building.
“Yeah, I’m excited. I mean, I think it’s an exciting time of year.
You know, you’re excited coming into training camp, and you want to see how it looks and see how it feels and see how it progresses,” Muse said. “I think that we were able to take some steps as we move through training camp, and now it’s going into Game 1, and so I’m excited for the opportunity ahead here for this group and to be working together to take steps every day.”
After a couple of weeks of camp and preseason, the games finally count.
Here we go.
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