Penguins Defensemen Finding New Rhythm as Third Pair

The 2023-24 season hasn’t been easy for Ryan Graves as he slowly descends the Pittsburgh Penguins defensive depth chart. Now, suiting up on the third pairing with Chad Ruhwedel, Graves has been given the task of playing a simpler game.

After a few games together, the two have become a solid third pairing for the Penguins and have helped Graves make strides towards a deserved promotion.

“When you look at us as a pair, you think simple,” Graves said. “I think we’ve been good defensively. Obviously, Chad brings a different dynamic than playing with Kris [Letang] or Karl [Erik Karlsson].”

Sheltering Graves into this new role hasn’t been an ideal situation for the newbie, but it has without doubt promoted the better aspects of his game.

In the Penguins most recent contest against the Philadelphia Flyers, Graves saw his ice time take a jump back north of 15 minutes. Graves hopes that his run of solid performances can continue and help him make progress.

“I think it’s important for me to have a string of good ones to just find some consistency,” Graves said. “It’s been good, and I think that was a game of how I should play. Just being hard on pucks and hard to play against.”

Not only were the Graves and Ruhwedel pair hard to play against, they managed to find some offence when Graves helped set up Ruhwedel for his first goal of the season.