By DAVE STUBBS, The Montreal Gazette
http://www.montrealgazette.com/sports/index.html
January 13,2011
PITTSBURGH, PA - JANUARY 05: Sidney Crosby #87 of the Pittsburgh Penguins skates during warmups prior to taking on the Tampa Bay Lightning on January 5, 2011 at Consol Energy Center in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. (Photo by Justin K. Aller/Getty Images)MONTREAL - This wasn't the largest shadow that an absent Sidney Crosby had cast over the Bell Centre.
That would have been in late January 2009, when a massive likeness of the Pittsburgh Penguins superstar stretched across the north face of the arena. No better way to promote the NHL's 57th All-Star Game than with hockey's best player featured in a banner nearly large enough to wrap around Alex Ovechkin's ego.
Crosby didn't play in the almost-annual 2009 all-star "classic," nursing a knee injury. But the recipient of a still-record 1,713,021 fan votes did make an appearance that weekend to glad-hand league brass, corporate bigwigs and the myriad mooches.
Last night, Crosby missed his second Bell Centre game in six nights, a conspicuous absence that again crushed the dozens of young fans who arrived wearing their No. 87 Penguins jerseys in a show of affection for the NHL's most luminescent talent.
If they were fans of Crosby's team as well, surely they were lifted by Pittsburgh ending its three-game losing skid and snapping the Canadiens' three-game win streak with an entertaining 5-2 victory.
Sid the Kid remains idle, still showing signs of the mild concussion he suffered New Year's Day in the NHL's Winter Classic, flattened by Washington's David Steckel, or four nights later, when feeling less than 100 per cent he was splattered into the end glass by Tampa Bay's Victor Hedman.
It's also possible that Crosby was concussed by the cumulative effect of the two hits.
"I believe he's getting tested this week again and he's getting better," Penguins head coach Dan Bylsma said yesterday after his team's morning skate. "We're not going to progress until the symptoms subside."
Crosby flew into Montreal with his teammates last Wednesday, spent the night here, then returned to Pittsburgh the following afternoon, hours before the Penguins lost a 2-1 shootout to the Canadiens.
Bylsma dropped the concussion bomb in the aftermath of that defeat and Pittsburgh then fumbled the next two without their captain, returning to Montreal last night on a three-game skid that had seen them score only three goals and surrender 10.
The jury is out on the legality and certainly the ethics of the Steckel hit, which drew no penalty. Many say it was an avoidable blindside headshot; others argue that Steckel tried to avoid Crosby as the Capitals winger raced back up ice, spinning his opponent in a flailing pirouette with the violent collision as he sped by.
The Hedman check was comparatively innocent, a hit you'll see more than once in every game.
Beyond Crosby's concussion is the troubling issue of players clobbering each other when the puck and the eyes are elsewhere.
The fragile brain is not, in fact, an immovable object. It shifts dangerously in the skull when struck with the irresistible force of someone clad in battle-armour who's travelling at high speed.
Crosby's injury had immediate effect. Following last week's shootout loss to the Canadiens, the Penguins were beaten 4-0 by Minnesota then stunned 4-2 by the Bruins, with Boston roaring back to score four times in that game's final 195 seconds.
Bylsma might have been hoping yesterday that the loss to Boston would be a good omen -on Nov. 10, the Bruins scored five unanswered third-period goals to beat the Penguins 7-4. Then Pittsburgh played their next 15 games without a loss, a streak that included 12 straight wins.
The coach wasn't using Crosby's concussion as a crutch for his team's recent struggle. He said it's been more a matter of the Penguins not going to the net and controlling the offensive zone, two things they did almost to perfection last night.
"This group of guys in the past -not everyone -have played without Sid for some period of time," Bylsma said. "I actually sense a determination to try to win games without him there.
"We're a good team, we have good players. And those players want to prove it and get to the business of winning games."
The process began, again, last night.
It's not right that the hit(s) sending Crosby to the sidelines should be viewed with any more gravity than the numerous shots injuring others. But as the player on whom the NHL aims its brightest spotlight, that's simply the way it is.
Sometimes, it takes firsthand experience to speak up. Crosby said nothing last March when his teammate, Matt Cooke, destroyed Boston's Marc Savard with an open-ice blindside hit, sidelining the Bruins star until the playoffs' second round. That unpenalized hit gave birth to NHL Rule 48: Illegal Check to the Head. [See Crosby's comments on the Savard hit below]
Last Saturday, Crosby said his piece.
"I feel like (Steckel) could have gotten out of the way and avoided me," he said. "Whether he tried to hurt me, only he knows. I guess we'll never know that, but you still have to be responsible out there."
Crosby has now had his eyes opened, figuratively and literally.
Of course, hockey is poorer for his absence; even with an absolutely terrific game, the Bell Centre lost more than a bit of lustre last night.
That will return. And you must hope that hockey's best player is back only when fully healthy, unsusceptible to a frightening repeat, and that the game and its players see this, finally, as a wake-up call to their own reckless irresponsibility.
dstubbs@montrealgazette.comTwitter.com/habsinsideout1
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From The Pens Blog:
"At some point there’s got to be a clear indication from the league because we’ve seen this so many times now,” Penguins captain Sidney Crosby said. “You don’t like to see anyone, their own teammate or an opposing player, lay on the ice like that. That was scary.” - Sidney Crosby
http://thepensblog.com/pensblog-news/jobber-posts/deadspin-should-probably-do-some-more-research.html
More from Sidney Crosby on the Cooke/Savard hit:
http://penguins.nhl.com/club/news.htm?id=521013&cmpid=pit-twt-pghpenguins
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10070/1041933-61.stm
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