CRANBERRY — Winger Bryan Rust will not be in the Pittsburgh Penguins lineup Thursday when the team hosts the New York Islanders at PPG Paints Arena.

Rust, 32, who scored a career-high 31 goals last season, suffered a lower-body injury in preseason and missed the Penguins’ first game of the season, against the New York Rangers on Tuesday.

Rust was one of the last players off the ice Thursday morning, and coach Dan Muse confirmed he will not play. Rust was rotating in line drills during practice on Wednesday.

Tristan Jarry

Arturs Silovs had a 25-save shutout Tuesday in the 3-0 win over New York. However, Muse is establishing a goalie rotation early this season.

Tristan Jarry will start on Thursday in the home opener.

“I think it’s so early, we just want to get everybody going, get different guys going. I thought Tristan, you know, you go through the late part of training camp, I think he was really trending in a really good direction,” Muse said. “We look at all things, but we went into it thinking that we’d like to get both guys in there early, and that’s what we’re doing.”

Last season was a roller coaster for Jarry with far more downs than ups. After struggling in the first half of the season and giving up a goal on the first shot faced six times in the first 22 games, the Penguins waived Jarry in January.

However, a month later, the team recalled him after rookie Joel Blomqvist struggled. Jarry was the Penguins’ primary goalie down the stretch.

Jarry’s final stat line last season was a 16-12-6 record with an .893 save percentage and 3.09 goals against average.

Filip Hallander

It’s been a long journey back to Pittsburgh. Filip Hallander was the Penguins’ second-round pick in 2018 (59th overall) and made his NHL debut on April 7, 2022, against the Rangers.

He will return to the Penguins’ lineup on Thursday.

“I thought he was another guy. I think he got more and more comfortable. And if you look at the later exhibition games, I feel like he was really at the point where he’s starting to play his game,” said Muse. “I think there might have been an adjustment coming back over here. The game is a little bit different.

Obviously, he’s been over here and he’s he’s played over in North America before, but he’s also coming from Sweden, it’s just a little bit of a different game … So I think it took a little (time). I thought he game was solid at the beginning (of camp), but I thought it got a lot better there towards the end of training camp.”

In August 2020, the Penguins included him as part of the trade package to the Toronto Maple Leafs for Kasperi Kapanen. However, approaching the 2021 Expansion Draft, the Penguins reacquired him when they traded Jared McCann to Toronto, rather than lose McCann for nothing in the expansion draft.

In April 2023, Hallander returned to his hometown team in Sweden in the Swedish Elite League and was the league’s second-leading scorer last season with 53 points, and he scored 26 goals.

Hallander chose to return to North America, signing with the Penguins last spring. He does not yet have an NHL point.

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