The Pittsburgh Penguins might be the biggest surprise team in the NHL this season. When the 2025-26 season began, the expectation was that this team would be very bad, taking a longer-term approach to its rebuild and probably selling off and trading more veteran players at the trade deadline.
The exact opposite has happened. They not only look like a playoff team right now, but they are also starting to steamroll and dominate teams, and are in a position where they probably should be buying.
Veteran forwards Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Rickard Rakell, and Bryan Rust are still playing great, productive hockey. Cheap free-agent additions like Justin Brazeau and Anthony Mantha have been outstanding, exceeding expectations. Ben Kindel, the No. 11 overall pick in the 2025 NHL Draft, has made an immediate impact and looks like a potential franchise-changing player.
Egor Chinakhov arrived in an in-season trade from the Columbus Blue Jackets a couple of weeks ago and has continued to score goals and play great. They might have the best fourth line in hockey right now. It is an incredibly deep team at forward, with more young help on the way from Wilkes-Barre/Scranton in the American Hockey League.
Their first priority should be looking for younger players with term that fit into their long-term plans. Unless somebody like Jason Robertson is realistically available, their focus should be on defensive depth. While that group, led by Erik Karlsson and Kris Letang, has surprised and perhaps even overachieved, they could still use some more depth at the position, both short-term and long-term, if they are going to start contending for the Stanley Cup anytime soon.