This was a few days ago, before the Penguins lost Wednesday for the sixth time in eight games, before they were beaten by the Washington Capitals, 4-3, in a shootout to fall to 0-11-3 against the NHL's other top teams. I'm sure coach Dan Bylsma still is singing the same song.

"Do I believe in this team? Yes, I do," he said. "Do I believe in these players? Absolutely."

I'm trying to believe, too. Really. I want to believe the Penguins are going to roll through their final eight games, soar into the playoffs and vigorously defend their Stanley Cup. But it gets a little harder every day.

I know there are two ways of looking at Wednesday's game.

One is that the Penguins, who were without Evgeni Malkin and Sergei Gonchar, played their best game in a long time and barely lost to the NHL's top team. They kept battling, getting the tying goal from Jordan Staal with 3:06 left. "That's the way we need to play," Bylsma said. "Our focus is on playing those [next] eight games exactly as we played tonight."

The other way of looking at it is that the Penguins blew a 2-1 lead in the third period and have been outscored, 8-1, in the third period and overtime of their three losses to Washington. The Penguins also blew a 2-0 lead in the shootout when Marc-Andre Fleury could have closed it out with a save against Alex Ovechkin or Alexander Semin, and Bill Guerin could have won it with a goal. Their power play gave up a short-handed goal to Semin after a bad giveaway by Sidney Crosby.

(A brief side note: Do you think Semin got a kick out of that? You might remember it was in 2008 when he said of Crosby: "What's so special about him? I don't see anything special there.")

Now back to the game:

I'm going half-empty on you this morning.

It's not so much the loss to the Capitals on the road when the Penguins weren't at full strength that is so troubling. It's that lousy record against the five teams ahead of them in the overall standings and the two teams right behind them heading into the games Thursday night. The Penguins are 0-1-2 against the Capitals, a cold, hard fact that Ovechkin noted after Washington's latest victory. "It was mentally a very important win for us. They miss Gonchar and Malkin, but they're still the Stanley Cup champions." You also probably know the Penguins are 0-6 against the New Jersey Devils, another likely opponent in the playoffs. They have been outscored by the Devils, 17-5.

"I know what our record is against New Jersey and Washington," Bylsma said the other day. He seemed calm, but he quickly turned defensive. "At this time last season, you might have been writing that our team is no good."

That's not true, of course. At this time last season, everyone was saying and writing nice things about the Penguins. They were playing their best hockey going into the playoffs, finishing 18-3-4 after Bylsma took over from fired Michel Therrien.

Unfortunately, the Penguins aren't playing their best hockey now. They have played great at times, just not often enough. They will be dominating a game, then lose focus or intensity and make a terrible mistake such as Crosby's giveaway.

Fleury has been as inconsistent as anyone, but he's the least of my worries. He'll be spectacular in the playoffs. He always is. Crosby also will play great because that's what he does, although he's having a tough go of it lately with no goals in six games and just one in the past nine.

But it's hard not to be concerned about Malkin's right-foot injury, which forced him to miss four of the past five games. It's also hard not to be troubled about the tough time the Penguins have had scoring goals -- nine consecutive games with three or fewer. You can point the finger at a lot of players: Max Talbot (one goal in 31 games, although it came Wednesday night), Ruslan Fedotenko (two in 29), Mike Rupp (two in 29), Matt Cooke (two in 22), Alex Goligoski (one in 46) and Kris Letang (none in 22). It's too soon to judge Alexei Ponikarovsky after just 10 games with the Penguins, but, really, has he done anything to impress you?

If there's reason to hope, it's that the next six games are at home -- beginning Saturday afternoon with one against the Philadelphia Flyers -- and the Penguins still could get on a roll heading into the playoffs. Five of the games are against teams that were in the lower half of the standings going into Thursday night. The other is against the Capitals April 6. It's nice to think the Penguins will win that one so they don't go 0-for-the-season against Washington and New Jersey.

"We weren't perfect at the end of last season, either," Bylsma said. "No one handed us the Cup on April 12. We had to earn it. We kept working and got better. This team is going to keep pushing to get better."

Clearly, the man believes.

I promise to keep trying.

These Penguins don't make it easy.