Penguins forward Brock McGinn is eager to prove who he is again

Brock McGinn had a great view of how the Pittsburgh Penguins’ 2021-22 season came to an end.

After all, he was sitting in the penalty box at Madison Square Garden.

During overtime of Game 7 in the first round against the New York Rangers on May 15, McGinn took the puck into the offensive zone on the right wing but was stripped by Rangers defenseman K’Andre Miller.

With Miller converting the turnover into an offensive rush, McGinn tracked him down and prevented a quality scoring chance but took a holding penalty in the process.

A few moments later, Rangers forward Artemi Panarin scored on the ensuing power play to give his team a 4-3 victory that ended McGinn’s first season with the Penguins in an unappetizing fashion.

A few days later, McGinn didn’t avoid responsibility for the mishap.

“That’s something I’ll have to live with,” McGinn said during his season-ending media availability. “That’s a tough bounce. I’ve just got to get the puck in there and not turn it over and let that happen.”

Almost five months later, McGinn is still living with that moment. But he’s hardly dwelling on it.

“You obviously think about it,” McGinn said following practice Thursday. “It’s a tough thing. But I think to grow, you’ve got to move past things and just continue to try and get better every single day. It’s a new season, and I’m focused on it.”

Not much appears to have changed for the 28-year-old entering his second season with the team. He primarily is being deployed on the team’s fourth line as well as one of the top members of the penalty kill.

“I think I kind of have the same role,” McGinn said. “When I play with (center Teddy Blueger), we’re getting put out there in situations in the defensive zone and we have to bear down and execute and make sure we’re not getting scored on. And maybe chip in offensively as well. When we play our game, I think we can create a lot of offense as well. It’s about playing the full 200-foot game.”

Playing a full-82 games season was a challenge for McGinn last season — at least the second half of it.

After missing three games in January because of covid-19, he was sidelined for 15 contests throughout March and April after suffering a right hand injury from blocking a shot.

The difference was considerable in terms of his production between the first and second half of his campaign.

In his first 39 games, he posted 15 points (10 goals, five assists) and looked like a threat to reach the 20-goal plateau.

But his final 25 games saw him record only seven points.

“Just got out of sync there with a couple of injuries,” McGinn said. “Maybe just getting back, it didn’t go as well as maybe the start of the year points-wise. But I don’t think points fully say everything. You’ve got to be part of the team no matter what. Whether it’s killing penalties or playing strong defense, I think you’re just trying to go out there and helping the team win as best as you can.”

Management is optimistic the play McGinn offered in the first portion of the season is the true representation of what he can offer the team.

“I do think that’s the player that (McGinn) is,” Penguins coach Mike Sullivan said. “He’s a competitive guy, he’s a conscientious player, he’s hard to play against. He’s one of those glue guys that I think make your team hard to play against. He does a lot of the little things that add up to winning games. It’s everything from blocking shots, executing wall plays to help us get out of our end, he’s a good penalty killer. He’s hard to play against. We can play him against other team’s top players. He gets a lot of defensive zone starts, if he’s playing with Teddy Blueger, for example. So we put him in tough situations. … He’s that type of player. Those players are vitally important to the team that we want to become.”

The only notable change for McGinn as he enters the 2022-23 campaign is what side of the ice he is on. Throughout camp, the left-hander has been skating at left wing after spending most of the previous season on the right side.

“I rotate left wing, right wing,” McGinn said. “I did the same thing (as a member of the Carolina Hurricanes). I’m used to both sides. It’s kind of where I fit in.”

McGinn was signed as an unrestricted free agent in the summer of 2021, agreeing to a four-year contract with a salary cap hit of $2.75 million, the largest contract given to an incoming free agent during Ron Hextall’s tenure as general manager. Viewed as a replacement for popular forward Brandon Tanev, who was lost through that year’s expansion draft, McGinn still shoulders heavy expectations.

He professes he is still more than capable of meeting them.

“I just wanted to prove myself to everybody on this team,” McGinn said. “And just continue to push forward there.”

Note: Blueger remains “day to day” due to an undisclosed injury that has sidelined him since Sept. 28. He skated prior to Thursday’s practice in Cranberry.

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Seth Rorabaugh is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Seth by email at srorabaugh@triblive.com or via Twitter .