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Note: You can follow the Penguins on the Penguins Plus blog at PG-Plus. Membership in that site is only $3.99 per month or $36 per year.

Note II: Q&A readers regularly inquire about the well-being of longtime public-address announcer John Barbero, who is battling brain cancer. While there has been no recent update on his condition, Penguins officials report that attempts to have Barbero involved, on tape, in tonight's festivities surrounding the final regular-season game at Mellon Arena did not work out. His distinctive voice is scheduled to be heard at least at one point during the ceremony, however.

Q: Do you think the Pens have what it takes to even make it past the first round of the playoffs? Despite constant talk about it, they have been unable to elevate their game or play with any consistency. I seriously feel like throwing up when watching them. Their goaltending has been poor, their power play has been pathetic all year and their defensemen have more offensive skills than defensive skills. It just seems like their heart isn't in it. I mean, Evgeni Malkin doesn't play in a very important playoff-type game because of "illness" and Sergei Gonchar took two weeks off because of a sore throat. Yeah, I know it was strep, but two weeks? During a pivotal part of the season? Maybe I'm just aggravated. I'm sure I will feel better when they barely beat the Islanders in a shootout Thursday.

Mike, Grand Rapids, Mich.

MOLINARI: Yes, the Penguins are capable of getting past the first round of the playoffs, where it looks as if they'll be pitted against Ottawa, although there obviously is no guarantee they will. The real challenge will come after that, when they might start running into teams like Washington and New Jersey that dominated them during the regular season.

While no team is going to be eager to face the Penguins because of their exceptional individual talent and the fact that they won a championship in 2009, no quality club should be afraid to play them, either. The Penguins simply did nothing over the course of this season to prove that they can compete at the level the league's top teams reach.

(Of course, it's possible that all the elements of their game will come together once the playoffs begin. It's also possible that everyone reading this will win a lottery today. Neither seems like a particularly good bet at this point.)

If anyone is getting physically ill from watching the Penguins, the logical move -- being offered without benefit of a medical degree -- would be to stop watching. Some stresses in life can't be avoided; those caused by something that is supposed to provide a diversion from one's daily trials and tribulations don't make that list.

Finally, there is absolutely no reason to question the commitment of Malkin and Gonchar. If Malkin had played and performed poorly Tuesday, he would have been criticized for not taking the night off and allowing a healthy teammate to take his lineup spot. As for Gonchar, the Penguins have been carrying seven defensemen for most of the season. If any of them is operating at significantly less than 100 percent because of injury or illness, it shouldn't be catastrophic to plug in a replacement for at least a few games.

Those who question whether Gonchar made the right move by sitting out until he felt ready to handle something close to his usual workload might want to flash back to his final appearance before leaving the lineup. That was the Penguins' 3-1 loss in Detroit March 22 when Gonchar turned in a performance reminiscent of those from the early weeks of the 2005-06 season. Can anyone really believe that it would have been in the Penguins' best interest to have him play at that level during the entire time he was battling strep?

Q: I understand Dan Bylsma pulling the goalie with two minutes left against Washington, trying to tie the game. But when there are 30 seconds left, still a two-goal deficit and Alexander Ovechkin on the ice, leave Brent Johnson in the net. The Pens weren't going to tie the game and Ovechkin got yet another empty-net goal. Did Dan Bylsma just lose the Rocket Richard Trophy for his captain?

Matt Fennell, Bradford, Ohio

MOLINARI: Sidney Crosby is ultra-competitive, which is part of the reason he's been so successful in this game. There's no question that he'd like to win the NHL's goal-scoring race, just as he'd like to win anything else with which he is involved.

However, one suspects that when Ovechkin scored into an empty net with two-tenths of a second left in the Capitals' 6-3 victory at Mellon Arena Tuesday night, Crosby's most pressing concern was not that Ovechkin had just tied him for the top spot with his 48th of the season (a league-high five of which have been scored into empty nets).

Individual accomplishments and honors are important, of course, or they wouldn't be recognized, but this is a team sport, and the outcome of a game is more important than the individual performances that shape it. The Penguins needed the two points that were at stake Tuesday -- losing those likely has doomed them to finishing second in the Atlantic Division and getting the No. 4 seed in the Eastern Conference -- and Bylsma's mandate was to do everything possible to give his team a chance to claim them.

If that meant enhancing the chances of Ovechkin picking up a freebie by replacing Johnson with an extra attacker, even as the third period was winding down and the chances of scoring twice to force overtime had all but vanished, that was the right thing to do.

And if anyone questions what matters most to players, ask Ovechkin if he'd swap the points and goals titles he earned in 2008-09 for a Stanley Cup.

Penguins Plus, a blog by Dave Molinari and Shelly Anderson, is featured exclusively on PG+, a members-only web site from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Our introduction to PG+ gives you all the details.