There is a school of thought, and some pretty convincing data, that suggests teams that are more than four points out of a playoff spot by American Thanksgiving have an extraordinarily low chance of making the Stanley Cup Playoffs.
The good news for the 2023-24 Pittsburgh Penguins is that they are within that four-point window.
The bad news is they are still three points back, in 11th place in the Eastern Conference and only have a .500 record through 18 games.
It could be worse.
It should definitely be better.
Given all of that, here are some random thoughts on where the Penguins are at one of the schedule’s milestone dates.