Crosby and Malkin are engaging in a king-of-the-hill rivalry

And the Penguins are benefiting to the max

Wednesday, April 16, 2008
By Ron Cook, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette



Peter Diana/Post-Gazette
Who is #1? Evgeni Malkin or Sidney Crosby

OTTAWA -- That is some game of Can You Top This? that Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin have going in these Stanley Cup playoffs. If you didn't know better, you would think they are in a competition to be known as the best hockey player in the world.

"That's exactly what they are thinking," Penguins teammate Ryan Whitney said yesterday.

"That's why both are elite players. Both want to be the best. Both have that in them."

There are plenty of reasons the Penguins own a 3-0 series edge against the Ottawa Senators and can squash the last bit of life out of them in Game 4 tonight, but the greatness of Crosby and Malkin has to be near the top of the list. Malkin was the bigger star in Games 1 and 2 at Mellon Arena, getting three points each night and setting up linemate Petr Sykora for three of the prettiest -- not to mention easiest -- goals you'll see. Crosby was the man Monday night in Game 3, breaking not just a 1-1 tie with a huge goal 12 seconds into the third period, but the hearts of the Sens Army, as the Ottawa fans like to call themselves.

What?

You thought Crosby was just going to sit back and give up that "best-player" label without a fight?

Of course, Crosby downplayed that there's anything even remotely going on between him and Malkin. "We both just want to help the team win. I think we both feel responsibility -- especially offensively -- for producing."

Penguins coach Michel Therrien was even more adamant.

"I don't see it as competition between the two at all. Both guys have huge roles and both are taking their game to a new level in the playoffs. Both are great leaders and both want to lead the right way."

What the big deal is, I don't know. In this case, we're talking about healthy competition. As Penguins forward Max Talbot put it, "They're not playing for numbers, those two. They're playing for the team."

Maxime gets no argument here.

But, really, what's wrong with wanting to be the best?

Don't all great players have an ego?

The proud Crosby always has wanted to be the guy. He's a lot like Mario Lemieux that way. It was a little harder to tell with Malkin. At least it was until this season when he stepped up when Crosby went out with a high ankle sprain. Malkin had 20 goals and 26 assists in the 28 games Crosby missed. I'm thinking he loved the starring role.

"The big question a lot of the media has been asking is: 'Can Malkin keep on doing it with Sid back?' " Talbot said. "Believe me, he's kept on doing it."

The Penguins are on the edge of Round 2 of the playoffs because of it, because Malkin has elevated his game to Crosby's extraordinary level.

"Those are probably going to be the two best players I ever play with," Whitney said. "It's just a pleasure to be on the same ice with them."

Therrien can say the same thing; Crosby and Malkin almost certainly will be the two best players he coaches. That has to explain his no-competition-between-the-two stance. He doesn't want to be put into any position where he's even hinting that one is better than the other.

Witness Therrien's handling of the Penguins' power play.

A lot of his critics have spanked him for using Crosby and Malkin on the same unit rather than splitting them and creating two groups that surely would tax even the best of penalty-killers. He could have stayed with Malkin, Sykora and Ryan Malone on one unit -- they were highly successful when Crosby was out -- and put Crosby with Marian Hossa and perhaps Jordan Staal on another group.

But Therrien has played Crosby with Malkin. The results have been mixed. The power play went 3 for 6 in Game 2 but just 1 for 5 in Game 1 and 1 for 8 in Game 3.

It seems obvious Therrien is willing to take a bit less production in order to keep the stars happy.

Just say he's looking at the big picture.

Therrien learned a long time ago that a coach needs to keep his captain on his side, the better to have his back in the dressing room. That's why Crosby always is included in the Penguins' decision-making. Along the way, Therrien also learned you don't offend the other world-class players on your roster. Malkin has reached that status.

If Therrien sent out Malkin, Sykora and Malone first on the power play, that would be like telling Crosby he's on the second unit. If he sent out Crosby's group first, he would be saying the same thing to Malkin. And what happens if the first group gets 80 seconds of power-play time and the second gets only 40?

Therrien doesn't need those headaches.

But there is another way of looking at this:

Any coach would love to have Therrien's problems.

Any coach would love to have two players the caliber of Crosby and Malkin.

Any coach would love to have two stars who want to be called only one thing more than "best player in the world."

Champions.

Ron Cook can be reached at rcook@post-gazette.com.
First published on April 16, 2008 at 12:00 am

McLouth's ninth-inning blast ignites Pirates, 6-4

Three-run shot off Dodgers' closer comes after two outs

Tuesday, April 15, 2008
By Dejan Kovacevic, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette



Kevork Djansezian/Associated Press
Nate McLouth hits the game winning three-run home run off Los Angeles Dodgers closer Takashi Saito, in the ninth inning at Los Angeles last night.

LOS ANGELES -- One of these days, Nate McLouth is going to come back and touch Terra Firma.

Not quite yet, apparently.

He stepped to the box with two outs in the ninth inning, his team down a run, two aboard and one of the game's elite closers, Los Angeles' Takashi Saito, on the mound.

Crack!

Three-run home run.

Thirteen-game hitting streak, at least one hit in every game.

And, after closer Matt Capps zipped through the bottom half for his fourth save, the Pirates had what might have been their most uplifting victory of the young season, 6-4, last night at Dodger Stadium.

McLouth?

He was insisting, as he has for days now, that all is quite normal in his world, despite his .383 average, his team-high 14 RBIs out of the leadoff spot, and even after this dramatic shot.

"Oh, yeah, I'm still the same," McLouth said. "I know it sounds cliched, but I'm just taking things pitch by pitch."

Here, pitch by pitch, was how the Pirates extended their winning streak to four -- one shy of their 2007 high -- and won at these hallowed grounds for just the fifth time in the past 19 meetings ...

Los Angeles had built a 4-3 lead with two runs off Zach Duke in the sixth, and three relievers made that stand up until Saito, who was 39 of 43 in save opportunities as a Cy Young Award candidate last year, entered for the ninth.

Jose Bautista's one-out single provided the glimmer. Luis Rivas struck out for the second out, and up came pinch-hitter Adam LaRoche, too sick once again to start but well enough to hit a couple of moon shots in batting practice and convince manager John Russell he was available. He singled up the middle.

McLouth came up looking for first-pitch heat, but he got a slow Saito curve instead and steered clear, emblematic of the patience that has been so pivotal to his start.

The heat came with the next pitch, 93 mph, up and over the inner part of the plate. And McLouth did exactly what anyone who has been watching him these two weeks would expect: He crushed it high into the right-field pavilion for his second home run, one that put the Pirates ahead, 6-4.

"I just wanted to wait for my pitch," McLouth said. "I'm guessing he made a mistake."

No need to guess.

"It's a pity," Saito said. "I'm disappointed. I threw the pitch the batter was waiting for."

LaRoche recalled feeling a good vibe standing at first base, but not that good.

"I thought Nate would come through and tie it," LaRoche said. "Honestly, though, even as hot as he is, I wasn't expecting him to go deep there. How about that? How about this kid? I am telling you, it could not happen to a better guy than Nate McLouth. I love it."

So, obviously, does Russell.

"Nate's our catalyst," he said. "He just keeps coming up with big hits."



Kevork Djansezian/Associated Press
Pitcher Matt Capps throws against the Los Angeles Dodgers in the ninth inning, silencing any chance of a Dodgers reply.

Russell had much else to appreciate in this one ...

Bautista snapped an 0-for-10 slide with a two-run home run in the second off a Hiroki Kuroda slider, and Xavier Nady's RBI double in the sixth accounted for the Pirates' 3-2 lead to that point.

Starter Zach Duke gave up two runs in the bottom half to allow Los Angeles to leapfrog, but he exited with a passable line of four runs, three earned, through his six innings. This despite, per his admission, having little beyond his sinker that was fully effective.

"I had to battle," Duke said. "But I wanted to give our team a chance, and I feel like I did that."

John Grabow and Tyler Yates followed with scoreless seventh and eighth innings, the bullpen's best having been summoned by Russell despite the Pirates trailing, 4-3.

A show of confidence?

"We were close," Russell explained. "I felt like we were having good at-bats all night, with a lot of patience, and that we were going to give ourselves a chance at some point."

That patience trait was evident in the ninth, when Saito was taxed for 28 pitches. Although Saito insisted "my condition was not a problem," the final pitch to McLouth might suggest otherwise.

"Anytime you can get a closer into the 25-pitch range, you're pushing him," Russell said.

The mood in the clubhouse was similar to McLouth's: Satisfied but not exactly celebratory.

"I've been saying all along that this team plays with a lot of pride, a lot of heart, that we're going to fight to the last pitch," Yates said. "How many times have we done this now?"

"Really, it's a win," McLouth said, clearly downplaying the outcome with every wave of reporters that asked questions at his stall. "It doesn't really matter how you win or who does it. We had a lot of guys who played a great game, and it all came together. It's nice."

Nice?

Well, leave it to injured shortstop Jack Wilson, never one to shrug off excitement, to come up with this ...

"New nickname," Wilson said. "Mighty Mouse McLouth."

Dejan Kovacevic can be reached at dkovacevic@post-gazette.com.
First published on April 15, 2008 at 1:14 am

Crosby ruins Senators’ hopes

By Joe Starkey
PITTSBURGH TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Tuesday, April 15, 2008



Penguins captain Sidney Crosby celebrates his third-period goal against the Senators at Scotiabank Place in Game 3 of first-round Stanley Cup action, April 14, 2008. The Penguins won, 4-1, and took a 3-0 series lead.
Chaz Palla/Tribune-Review

OTTAWA: Sidney Crosby, secret weapon.

In case you'd forgotten that Crosby deserves a prominent spot -- maybe right at the top -- in any rational ranking of the world's best hockey players, he delivered a stark reminder 12 seconds into the third period Monday night.

Imagine the terror Ottawa Senators forward Antoine Vermette must have felt.

Vermette was covering for a defenseman, trying to corral a bouncing puck near the Senators' blue line, as Crosby bore down on him at roughly 200 mph.

Crosby poked the puck past Vermette without breaking stride to set up a 2-on-1 with Marian Hossa. It looked as if The Kid would pass, but at the last moment, he snapped a shot past goaltender Martin Gerber on the short side.

"What a goal," Penguins coach Michel Therrien said.

Crosby made it sound easy.

"I just had a good bounce, good luck," he said. "Marian was coming up on the right side, and I just had a chance to shoot. I found my spot. Chances are few and far between, especially in the playoffs.

"It was nice to convert."

It was more than nice.

It snapped a 1-1 tie and sent a jolt of electricity through the Penguins' bench (it also was the fastest goal at the start of a period in Penguins playoff history).

"You could feel the jump on our bench," defenseman Brooks Orpik said.

A little more than a minute later, Jordan Staal deflected a puck past Gerber to make the score 3-1. The Senators were toast.

The Penguins had absorbed Ottawa's best shot and would survive with a 4-1 victory and a three-games-to-none lead in the series.

Crosby's goal changed everything. It also made Marc-Andre Fleury's terrific goaltending stand up.

In a way, it's understandable that Crosby had become something of a sidebar lately. He did, after all, miss 28 games with an ankle injury.

But if you listened long enough to some of the warped minds out there, you would have thought he was a has-been at age 20.

Never mind that when he sustained his high-ankle sprain three months ago, Crosby was tied for the NHL scoring lead and was just heating up.

Never mind that he still finished second in the league in points per game (1.36), a fraction behind Alexander Ovechkin.

Never mind that Crosby was coming off a Game 2 performance in which he recorded four assists and started the winning play.

Was that the least-heralded four-assist playoff game on record, or what?

"I don't know if people forget (how good Crosby is)," defenseman Ryan Whitney said, "but he just turned it on at the end there."

These Penguins grow up a little every day.

Last night's lesson was titled How to Kick a Team When It's Down. Wednesday in Game 4, it will be How to Finish The Job.

You knew the Penguins would have to weather a storm, with Ottawa captain Daniel Alfredsson making a dramatic return from a knee injury that had kept him out of the first two games.

To compound matters, the Penguins learned prior to the game that they would be without Gary Roberts, who had been a major factor.

Sure enough, the Senators played with renewed fervor in the first period.

Fleury (33 saves) held up strong. His best stop was a ridiculous toe save on Dany Heatley in the second period.

By the end of that frame, the Senators had begun to lose some steam. The Penguins liked where they stood.

"We felt comfortable with a tie game," Therrien said. "We always play really good in the third period. That's what I told the players. I said, 'I'm comfortable with where we are right now -- and we really could hurt them.' "

Crosby, who has six points in the series, delivered the lethal blow.

Therrien laughed when he was asked if the goal reminded some people that Crosby might be the best player on the planet.

"He's right there," the coach said. "He's right there."


Joe Starkey is a sports writer for the Tribune-Review. He can be reached at jstarkey@tribweb.com.

Matured Fleury is the key

Tuesday, April 15, 2008
By Ron Cook, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette



KANATA - APRIL 14: Marc-Andre Fleury #29 of the Pittsburgh Penguins celebrates his teams win against the Ottawa Senators during game three of the 2008 NHL Eastern Conference Quarterfinals on April 14, 2008 at Scotia Bank Place in Kanata, Ontario, Canada. (Photo by Dave Sandford/Getty Images)

OTTAWA -- The big, noisy, hostile Scotiabank Place crowd didn't shake Marc-Andre Fleury this time. The emotional return of Ottawa Senators captain Daniel Alfredsson from your typical hockey playoff injury -- unspecified, of course -- didn't get to him. Not even the goal he gave up to Nick Foligno in the second period, which gave the Senators their first lead of the series, threw him off his game.

Fleury stood tall through it all last night.

As a result, the Penguins need just a win here tomorrow night to sweep the Senators into next season and move on to Round 2 in their pursuit of Lord Stanley's Cup.

The Penguins' 4-1 win in Game 3 long will be remembered for the goals Sidney Crosby and Jordan Staal scored in the first 90 seconds of the third period. But Fleury gave them a chance -- especially early -- by stopping everything the Senators threw at him, including Alfredsson, who was playing for the first time in the series.

"Our leader," they called Alfredsson during a stirring first-period video tribute in honor of his 100th career playoff game.

"Their captain, their heart and soul," was how Penguins coach Michel Therrien described Alfredsson.

Well, Fleury made sure Alfie was no factor.

None of the Senators were, really.

It was no shock that the Penguins were outshot, 9-3, in the first nine minutes, not considering the Senators' desperation after losing the first two games at Mellon Arena. But it also wasn't shocking that Fleury turned back everything in that first period.

"That's when you need your goaltender to make a difference," Therrien said. "He made some key saves for us. He kept us in the game ..."

Therrien paused, before making his final point.

"I'm not surprised," he said. "He was the best goaltender in the NHL the last 15 games and has been the best goaltender in the playoffs. Look at his save percentage, his goals against. He's got the best record."

Much was made before the series of how much the Penguins have grown and matured since their quick playoff exit against the Senators last spring. It seems obvious now that no one grew and matured more than Fleury.

What a difference there was between this game and Fleury's first playoff game here last spring, which just happened to be his first playoff game, period. It took the Senators only 97 seconds to score last spring -- a goal by defenseman Andrej Meszaros -- when Fleury caught his skate on his goal post and tumbled. Ottawa made it 2-0 five minutes later when a shot by winger Chris Kelly snuck between Fleury's legs.

The Penguins never recovered -- going out in five games -- even though Fleury played better as the series progressed.

Clearly, the Senators wanted to swarm Fleury the same way last night. They thought they had figured him out in Game 2 when they scored three times in fewer than 18 minutes after he had stoned them for more than 90 minutes, including a 4-0 shutout in Game 1. The Penguins still won Game 2, 5-3, but it was an eager Ottawa bunch that took the ice for Game 3.

Fleury was up to the challenge. This time, there was no tripping and falling. There were no cheap goals.

"He's just so comfortable in net right now, so confident," Penguins defenseman Ryan Whitney said. "That makes all of the rest of us confident."

Thanks to Fleury, the Penguins went to the first intermission, 0-0.

"That was definitely their best period," defenseman Brooks Orpik said. "Someone said it in here, 'That's the best they've got.' We came out of it, 0-0. That felt pretty good."

The Senators did beat Fleury on Foligno's goal at 1:11 of the second period for a 1-0 lead, but Whitney said it deserves an asterisk. Foligno batted the puck out of the air and past Whitney to soar in alone on Fleury.

"Put that one on me," Whitney said. "I should have played the body, but I was convinced the puck was going to the corner. That was my bad. Fleury had no chance."

The Senators certainly didn't get into Fleury's head because of that goal. He would not be beaten again, finishing with 33 saves. In the three wins, he has stopped 86 of 90 shots.

That Senators' lead lasted just 4:28 before the Penguins' Max Talbot scored. When Crosby and Staal got their goals early in the third period, the game was over.

Maybe the series, too.

Fleury wasn't picked as one of the three stars. The Penguins' Marian Hossa was No. 1 with a goal and two assists, Crosby was No. 2 and Foligno was No. 3, thanks to some home cookin'.

Fleury had a right to complain but passed. And why not? His teammates' respect is more important, isn't it?

"He was big for us early and really shut the door at the end," Whitney said. "He got us the win."

Three of 'em in this series, actually.

The way Fleury is playing, many more are ahead.

Ron Cook can be reached at rcook@post-gazette.com.
First published on April 15, 2008 at 12:00 am

Malkin a force

DAVID SHOALTS

From Saturday's Toronto Globe and Mail

April 11, 2008 at 11:32 PM EDT



PITTSBURGH - APRIL 11: Evgeni Malkin #71 of the Pittsburgh Penguins skates in front of a Ottawa Senators defender during game two of the 2008 NHL Eastern Conference Quarterfinals series on April 11, 2008 at Mellon Arena in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. (Photo by Gregory Shamus/NHLI via Getty Images)

PITTSBURGH — If anyone is looking for Exhibit A in why the Pittsburgh Penguins are a team transformed in this year's NHL playoffs, they can start with Evgeni Malkin.

One year ago, 14 of the large collection of Penguins youngsters made their playoff debuts. As most of them will admit now, they were an overawed bunch and the Ottawa Senators easily disposed of them in five games in the opening round.

None of the 14 had a less distinguished playoff debut than Malkin. He did have four assists in five games but the 6-foot-3, 200-pound centre was a ghostly presence, tip-toeing through the series.

Considering he ran up 33 goals and 52 assists for 85 points in his first NHL season after arriving from Russia, this was quite a disappointment.

But one year later, that embarrassing run is long forgotten. The Senators are once again the Penguins' playoff opponents but the team roles are reversed, as the youthful Penguins are putting last year's experience to work with their wonderful talent.

No one embodies this more than Malkin, who is now The Force From Magnitogorsk after his work in the first two games of this year's series.

The 21-year-old from Magnitogorsk, Russia had three points in Game 1 and was again the star of the game last night with another three points that allowed the Penguins to escape with a 5-3 win that gave them a 2-0 lead in the Eastern Conference quarter-final.

Malkin set up the Penguins' first three goals, two of them on the power play, to stake the hosts to a 3-0 lead. He also played a lead role killing penalties and was a physical force, using his big frame to flatten a couple of Senators, including tough winger Chris Neil.

"Yeah, one year's experience is a big deal," Malkin said through an interpreter, as his confidence in his English is not the same as his confidence in his playmaking skills. "I feel more comfortable."

There are two reasons for this, he said. One is that this year he is playing his natural position, centre, rather than on the wing, which he did a year ago. The other is having Petr Sykora on his right wing. They played together for Magnitogorsk Metallurg in the Russian league in 2004-05 when Sykora signed on during the NHL lockout.

"This year I'm playing with Sykora, I feel more familiar with this guy," Malkin said. "I feel much more comfortable this year than compared to last year."

You would have to go back to a former Penguin, 6-foot-4 superstar Mario Lemieux, to find a player who combines size with such considerable skill and speed. It is far too presumptuous to compare Malkin with the great Lemieux, of course, but so far in this series he is the most dominant player.

Asked how long he can keep up the Lemieux impersonation, Malkin smiled and said. "I am going to try my best to be myself."

In the second period last night, Malkin made two set-up plays on Penguins goals that left observers shaking their heads in wonder and the 17,132 fans at Mellon Arena roaring. The second setup, five minutes after the first one, was a thing of beauty.

Malkin came down the left side toward Senators goaltender Martin Gerber and, as he approached the top of the faceoff circle, lifted his stick to fake a shot. Gerber and both of his defencemen went for the fake. Malkin then flicked a pass across the high slot to Sykora, who once again ripped a one-timer to the open side of the net.

"He gives me those one-timers because the goalies do not know if he's going to shoot or pass," Sykora said. "That's why I get so much room."

At this point, the Senators looked ready for burial. Only Gerber, who faced 40 shots in the first two periods, kept them in the game. Six of those 40 shots came from Malkin. But the Sens managed to tie the score in the third period, throwing a momentary scare into the Pens.

Malkin remained a force with two breakaways in the first half of the period. Then the Penguins' other superstar stepped forward. Crosby set up the winning goal by Ryan Malone and assisted on Malone's empty-netter.

Now, with the series headed to Ottawa, the reeling Senators know they have to figure out a way to control Malkin if they are to make this anything less than a sweep, let alone a win.

Taking their best shot ... 54 times

By Gene Collier
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Saturday, April 12, 2008



Matt Freed/Post-Gazette
Sidney Crosby -- Ho-hum! Just another assist Friday night.

The Penguins had thrown everything possible, everything conceivable, everything they had at Ottawa goaltender Martin Gerber halfway through Game 2, everything but the cliche-clogged kitchen sink, except that Gerber looked up in the middle of the second period last night, and here came the kitchen sink.

Wearing No. 44.

Brooks Orpik, bolting free from the penalty box, taking a lead pass, skating in free on Gerber and flipping mentally through his robust array of poisonous offensive maneuvers, of which there are, of course, none.

And still the thundering defenseman who'd scored all of one goal this winter forced Gerber to turn away a fairly nifty backhander, but even though the puck slid harmlessly to Gerber's left, a political truth emerged fully mature in that moment.

If the Penguins are going to outshoot the Senators by something like 2-to-1 in these Eastern Conference quarterfinals, the Senators won't see the semis.

When Pittsburgh took 35 shots in Game 1, it was certainly an ominous sign north of the border. The Penguins, for all their offensive combustibility, are outshot more often than not. In the final 10 regular-season games, they'd been checked aggressively enough to limit them to fewer than 30 shots every time. When the Penguins outshoot opponents, they have the best winning percentage in the NHL.

Last night they had 40.

After two periods.

After three, with none other than Mario Lemieux following a big smile around an exceedingly pleased Penguins dressing room, you couldn't help but ask No. 66 if he could remember an evening when Pittsburgh's hockey club fired 54 shots.

"Been awhile," he said. "Was that a record?"

Heck yeah, 54 shots on goal. Cracked the Penguins' record for playoff shots in regulation of 49. Last night's total shots not on goal? Maybe 300.



Peter Diana / Post-Gazette
The Penguins' Petr Sykora scores his second goal in Game Two against Ottawa last night at the Mellon Arena.

"I think it's that we've finally stopped looking for the perfect play all the time," said Pascal Dupuis after Ryan Malone's heroic last-minute wrap-around goal and empty netter (shots 53 and 54) cut off Ottawa's air supply in this series. "We're always looking to make it perfect, but there's a lot to be set for shooting it on the net and crashing."

There's a lot to be said for forechecking as well, and clearly if the Senators are going to allow these Penguins to skate downhill into their end for most of the night, there is simply no answer to such a crisis.

"They've got a lot of talent," said Senators coach Bryan Murray, strangling the obvious. "When they have the puck and they're in your zone, they're very creative, especially five on three, or five on four; they're very good."

Here's the other truth that was self evident before the puck was dropped, but soon became highly relevant. The Senators have been down 2-0 in the playoffs five times. They've never once recovered.

That's likely why they played so desperately well for most of last night's throbbing third period, wiping out what was left of a 3-0 Penguins lead on a goal by Cody Bass. For most of that period, it looked as if the Senators had finally figured some things out in this series.

"I not sure that's what it was about," said Dupuis. "I think we were just not playing as solid defensively. You know, in the back of your mind, you've outscored them 7-0 at one point in the series, you start to think it's going to be easy and you start taking the easy way."

Dupuis had four shots on goal, passed on a fifth when he fed Hossa approaching from stage left on a play where Hossa actually skated through the goal mouth behind Gerber, but couldn't control the biscuit. Jordan Staal, Petr Sykora, and Sidney Crosby had six shots. Evgeni Malkin had eight.

On one third period power play, they whipped five rockets on Gerber, which is pretty frightening for a team that wasn't above playing an entire period without bothering to put even two pucks on net.

Late in the first period, the Penguins took an opportunity to show the Senators what you do with a five-skaters-to-three advantage, the very situation on which Ottawa twice failed to capitalize in Game 1.

With Chris Neil off for slashing, defenseman Chris Phillips got whistled for holding behind the Penguins net. Swarming five-on-three for 1:00, the Penguins snapped a scoreless tie when Sergei Gonchar blasted Malkin's soft pass against the back of the Ottawa net.

Malkin's assist meant that he'd scored as many points in four periods of this series as he had in all five games against Ottawa last spring.

"We were just trying to put it on the net and it resulted in a lot of quality chances," Malone said. "I'm not sure we'd been doing that enough."

If this idea catches on, what'll be next? Seventy-five shots?

Gene Collier can be reached at gcollier@post-gazette.com.
First published on April 12, 2008 at 12:00 am

Senators pay price for so much open ice

Penguins take full advantage of Ottawa's lackluster showing

By Gene Collier, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Thursday, April 10, 2008



Peter Diana / Post-Gazette
Penguins Petr Sykora celebrates his goal in the first period against the Senators at the Mellon Arena last night.

While it is generally this column's policy to create the ridiculous rather than to perpetuate it, let's just say the Penguins really did want to play Ottawa in the first round of these Stanley Cup playoffs, and that Sunday's performance in Philadelphia was accordingly some kind of sleep-walking wish-fulfilling dream.

Well, no wonder.

Unless there has been some kind of scheduling miscommunication that has led the defending Eastern Conference champions to believe that Game 1 is tonight, we're left to assume that last night's Senatorial privilege included a night off in uniform.

Really, what was that?

For a team that had beaten the Penguins seven times in the past nine tries, four of those in last spring's severely abridged first playoff round, the Senators skated as if they could win Game 1 on little more than that very brand of empirical evidence.

Ottawa's initial gambit seemed to be the abandonment of forechecking altogether, which allowed the Penguins to expend no more effort in their own end than they had in the morning skate. For those who remember the kind of suffocating pressure the Senators brought to the initial periods last April, this episode brought instead a startling lack of urgency.

"We're a much more mature team," Sidney Crosby said by way of explanation in the aftermath of a 4-0 Penguins win. "That wasn't our team in the first game last year. We're much improved and I think we proved that tonight."

Ottawa's performance was so impotent -- the Senators failed to convert 5-on-3 power plays repeatedly -- that it was hard to determine exactly what was proven in Game 1.

The basic reality must be that not even the NHL's singularly emotional postseason can camouflage the fact that Ottawa has now lost 25 of its past 39, and, more specifically, that with Daniel Alfredsson, Mike Fisher and Chris Kelly out with injuries, the Senators are without an ultra-talented trio of forwards who accounted for 29 percent of the team's goals this winter.

Another evident inversion, hinted at by Crosby, was the Penguins' swollen playoff experience this time around. Only four Penguins reported to the Arena last night without any playoff experience, whereas 16 were all but hopelessly callow last year.

The general fallout from all of that was that the Penguins enjoyed an excess of open ice, and when Evgeni Malkin poked the biscuit off the boards around Ottawa defenseman Mike Commodore in his own end and started a breathtaking 2-on-1 the other way with Petr Sykora late in the first period, the perils of affording open ice to power skaters were clearly evident.

Malkin put a cross-ice pass right on Sykora's tape, and not even the playoff tested Chris Phillips could prevent the goal that made it 2-0 Penguins.

Crosby came within a whisker of flipping a backhander past Martin Gerber 30 seconds later, which could have triggered a flow toward the exits, as the prospect of three Ottawa goals seemed like a project measured in weeks.

"We've gotta get a split here, that's all; that's what you have to get when you're the underdog on the road," Ottawa's Jason Spezza said late last night. "By no means do I think they were a much better hockey team tonight. We can play with them 5 on 5."

Uh-huh, but what is it going to take for the Senators to put a puck past Marc-Andre Fleury, a series of 5 on 2s?

"Five on 3, that should be automatic," Spezza admitted. "But we failed to capitalize."

Gerber looked extremely jittery in a two-goal first period, but gained confidence rapidly, particularly when he stoned Marian Hossa with a brilliant glove save at midperiod, seconds after stalwart Senators defenseman Anton Volchenkov took a Malkin shot off the forehead in the slot and exited, head in towel.

"A pressure cut, quite severe," said Ottawa coach Bryan Murray. "He couldn't put his helmet back on. The puck hit him in the helmet, dented it, but he could play the next game."

If there was any tangible byproduct the Senators could interpret to mean that tomorrow night's second game will be any different from this, it was likely the play of Gerber, who was the victim of defensive breakdowns in the third period more than of his own lingering anxiety.

"I think Gerbs really settled down," said Spezza. "He keeps playing like that, he'll give us a shot to win this series."

Of course, if the rest of the Senators keep playing like this, they'll give Gerber a chance to be vacationing at the earliest possible moment.

Gene Collier can be reached at gcollier@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1283.
First published on April 10, 2008 at 12:00 am

Roberts tortures Senators again

By Ron Cook, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Thursday, April 10, 2008



Peter Diana / Post-Gazette
Gary Roberts celebrates his goal in the first period against the Senators at the Mellon Arena last night.

Everybody in the old building knew what was up, from Ron Burkle and Mario Lemieux in the owners' box to Michel Therrien behind the bench to Sidney Crosby and Marc-Andre Fleury on the ice. It was absolutely critical that the Penguins start fast last night against the Ottawa Senators in Game 1 of their playoff series at Mellon Arena.

The Senators are a reeling hockey club, desperately trying to find their way without top injured players Daniel Alfredsson and Mike Fisher. If only they could take the Penguins' best shot early, if only they could find a way to steal the first game, if only they could find a reason to believe they have a chance against a much better, much deeper team in a series that has sweep written all over it ...

The Penguins didn't let it happen.

The game started exactly according to plan.

Well, almost.

It's safe to say few in the Penguins' dressing room predicted Gary Roberts would score the first goal just 68 seconds in to show the way to a 4-0 win. Crosby or Evgeni Malkin, maybe. Marian Hossa or Petr Sykora, who did get the killer second goal at 12:28 of the first period. But Roberts? Only Brooks Orpik seemed like a longer shot.

But there Roberts was, playing just his second game since Dec. 29 after missing 43 because of a broken left leg and bad high ankle sprain, injuries that -- let's be serious -- should have been too much for an old man to overcome. He looked as if he had Crosby's energy when he did a little man-to-man combat with Ottawa defenseman Wade Redden behind the Senators' net, nudging the puck to linemate Georges Laraque, who threw it toward the front of the net. He looked every bit as young as Malkin when he hurried to jump on that loose puck and flip a backhander past goaltender Martin Gerber.

"He didn't look like a man 41, that's for sure," Therrien would say afterward.

At that moment, as Gerber was fishing the puck out of his net, there probably were happier people in America than Roberts, but, please, don't ask me to name one.

"It sure is fun to contribute again," Roberts said.

The man had to have doubts that he would play last night let alone have such an impact, getting not just the first goal but also the fourth on the power play in the final two minutes. "Sure, I had doubts," he said. In late-February, not long after he skated to test his ankle and crumpled to the ice, he spoke openly of facing a tough battle to make it back. Crosby, not even half his age, came back from his high ankle sprain and had a setback. The same thing happened to Max Talbot.

How was an elderly gent supposed to do it? Even one who works out as maniacally as Roberts?

"He works so hard that you hope good things happen to him," Therrien said. "All of us are very, very happy for him."

Happy?

How about delirious at the thought of the damage Roberts might do once he gets his legs under him?

"He's got that thing in his eyes," Talbot said. "I don't know what it is, but it's pretty scary."

Roberts had hoped to play in the final five regular-season games but made it back for just the final one against the Philadelphia Flyers Sunday. Although his ankle held up after 12 minutes, 31 seconds of ice time, there was no guarantee that Therrien would use him in the playoffs.

Not that it was a tough decision to scratch young Jeff Taffe instead.

"It wasn't tough at all," Therrien said, "because Gary Roberts knows the importance of the playoffs."

In no particular order, Therrien loves the toughness that Roberts brings to the Penguins, his playoff experience -- this was his 120th postseason match -- and the fact he tortures the Senators.

Earlier in the decade, Roberts played with the Toronto Maple Leafs and was huge in eliminating the Senators in three different series with 10 goals and seven assists in 17 games. A year ago, when the Senators took the Penguins out of the playoffs in five games, Roberts was the prime reason the Penguins won Game 2 with a goal and an assist.

Now, Roberts has the Senators running scared again.

"It's still going to be a process for me. It's not going to happen overnight," Roberts said.

"I need to get my conditioning to the point where I can contribute on a consistent basis. I didn't have a lot of jump in my legs tonight. I was just fortunate to be in the right place at the right time.

"I'm just hoping I feel as good tomorrow as I do right now."

The Senators are hoping otherwise.

They paid Roberts the ultimate hockey compliment by trying to beat the heck out of him in the final few seconds.

You know, sending a message to Roberts before Game 2 tomorrow night.

"I was at the bottom of the pile, so I don't know who was punching me," he said. "I just knew I was getting hit a lot."

Roberts' puffy right eyelid showed it.

It looked as if it were about to explode.

Roberts clearly loved it.

How good it must have felt to have battle scars again.

Ron Cook can be reached at rcook@post-gazette.com.
First published on April 10, 2008 at 12:00 am

The controversy: Murray plays his desperation card

Wednesday, April 09, 2008
By Bob Smizik, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette



Peter Diana/Post-Gazette
Ottawa's Anton Volchenkov, right, delivers a head-snapping hit to Sidney Crosby in last year's series. The Penguins, a year older and wiser, vow things will be different this time.

Bryan Murray, the coach of the Ottawa Senators, is a desperate man. Not only does he take an injured and reeling team into the first round of the Stanley Cup playoffs tonight against the Penguins, who are healthy and surging, but he's looking hard at unemployment if his team is eliminated early.

And there's little doubt that elimination is what's facing Murray and the Senators.

Such desperate times call for desperate measures -- in this case truly desperate measures -- which is why Murray went on the attack earlier this week and suggested the Penguins lost their season finale Sunday to the Philadelphia Flyers so they would have an easier draw in the playoffs -- that draw being his Senators.

"I knew what was going on," claimed Murray. "You guys all know -- they wanted to play Ottawa. That's fine. That was fairly obvious from the drop of the puck."

What better way that to rile his dispirited bunch than to proclaim the Penguins wanted to play them because they're easier. It's about a simplistic a motivational tool as can be found, but it's about all Murray could muster.

The Senators are ripe to be had. Their championship window, gaping as recently as last season, is fast closing. They lost six of their final eight games and 24 of their final 38 and are expected to be without second leading-scorer Daniel Alfredsson and center Chris Kelly for this series.

There's no question the Senators are an easier opponent than the Flyers, who would have been at Mellon Arena tonight if the Penguins had won Sunday. But that hardly translate into deliberately attempting to lose a game.

That didn't stop Ottawa Sun journalist Don Brennan, a man desperate for a column, from not only agreeing with Murray but taking it a step further and writing, "[The Penguins] took a dive because they preferred a first-round matchup with the Senators."

For the benefit of Murray and Brennan, a team taking a dive does not give up one goal, which is all the Penguins allowed until an empty-netter in the final minute; it gives up six or seven with at least four of them coming in the first period.

A team taking dive does not play its top defenseman 29 minutes, 30 seconds, as the Penguins did with Sergei Gonchar.

The whole idea that the Penguins didn't want to win probably began when coach Michel Therrien decided to rest Sidney Crosby against the Flyers.

That is Therrien's choice, and it was a wise one. It's nice to see a coach with his eye on the real target -- the Stanley Cup -- and not the conference championship, which the Penguins would have won with a victory Sunday. The only thing surprising is that Therrien didn't rest more of his players, or at least give them less ice time.

If the Penguins really had wanted to tank it, that's their prerogative. All's fair in love, war and Stanley Cup competition. There's nothing wrong with wanting a lesser opponent, nothing wrong about desiring the easiest path to the Cup.

As far as the possibility of Murray and Brennan actually being correct, we'll allow veteran forward Gary Roberts to address that:

"[Murray] has an opinion, that's fine. We know we didn't go out there to throw the hockey game. I never put my skates on in my career when I went out hoping to lose or wanting to lose. Things didn't work out for us, but by no means did we throw the hockey game to play Ottawa."

As Roberts suggested, the Penguins were not at their best against the Flyers. There were plenty of reasons for that.

With a playoff spot and home ice clinched and with a message from the coach -- the resting of Crosby -- suggesting the game was not of the utmost importance, it's entirely possible Penguins were not as focused on victory as they might usually have been. But that was a product of human nature not a diabolical plot to disrespect Murray's players.

When the Senators eliminated the Penguins in five games last season, the young Penguins clearly were not ready for the playoffs. They got better as the series progressed but looked star-struck and dazed in the first game.

That won't happen this year.

"We're a different team," Crosby said after practice yesterday. "We've added guys with a lot of experience. We've faced adversity [in the form of multiple injuries] and came out of it pretty well."

Actually, they came through that adversity spectacularly well.

The Penguins will win in four, five at the most.

Bob Smizik can be reached at bsmizik@post-gazette.com.
First published on April 9, 2008 at 12:00 am

Dave Molinari on the Penguins: One man's playoff scrapbook

Beginning this week, you can expect your own memory book to grow, too.

Sunday, April 06, 2008
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette



Pittsburgh Penguins
Cup celebration in 1992

Sometime in the next few days, the Penguins will begin to manufacture a fresh batch of playoff memories.

Perhaps the snapshots that come out of their 2008 run, however long it lasts, will be sweet. Something their fans can savor for years.

Maybe they will be bitter, the kind that cannot fade quickly enough.

Four decades after the Penguins entered the league, the most enduring playoff memories for many of their fans -- at least the ones who are old enough -- likely are of their Stanley Cup-clinching victories in 1991 and 1992.

The first was an 8-0, Game 6 blowout at Minnesota, the second a 6-5, Game 4 squeaker in Chicago that ended with the Blackhawks pressing for a goal that would have forced overtime.

Both buildings where the Penguins won their championships -- the Met Center in Bloomington, Minn. and Chicago Stadium -- are gone now. Memories of what the Penguins achieved in those places will endure.

But while title-clinching victories are a franchise's signature triumphs, they aren't the only indelible impressions left during the Penguins' first 213 games of playoff hockey. Among the others:

• Frank Pietrangelo's glove stop on New Jersey's Peter Stastny during Game 6 of Round 1 in 1991. Known almost immediately -- and forever remembered -- as The Save, Pietrangelo's play made it possible for the Penguins to survive the opening round and eventually earn their first rings.

• Any number of Mario Lemieux goals. Lemieux splitting North Stars defensemen Neil Wilkinson and Shawn Chambers before scoring on Jon Casey during the 1991 final. Putting the puck between Boston defenseman Ray Bourque's legs en route to beating Andy Moog in the 1992 Wales Conference final. Knocking in a Larry Murphy rebound with 12.6 seconds left in regulation of Game 1 of the 1992 final.

• Legendary Tim Horton kicking the puck into his own net 12 seconds into overtime of Game 4 against Chicago at the Civic Arena in 1972. That goal, officially credited to Blackhawks center Pit Martin, completed a sweep for heavily favored Chicago, but two of those games were decided by one goal and the other two by two.

• Petr Nedved's quadruple-overtime goal through traffic that lifted the Penguins past Washington in Game 4 of the opening round at the Capital Centre in 1996.

• Ron Francis scoring from center ice against Mike Richter during the third period in Game 4 of the Penguins' second-round series against the New York Rangers in 1992. That goal altered the course of the game and, ultimately, the series, most of which the Penguins played without Lemieux and Joe Mullen.

• Florida's Tom Fitzgerald launching a shot from just inside the blue line and having it elude Tom Barrasso to break a 1-1 tie early in the third period of Game 7 at the Civic Arena in the 1996 conference final. That went down as the series-winner when the Panthers took home a 3-1 victory.

• Left winger Kevin Stevens standing in the middle of a steamy locker room at Boston Garden after a 5-4 overtime loss to the Bruins in Game 2 of the 1991 conference final and guaranteeing -- loudly, and repeatedly -- that the Penguins would rally from a 2-0 deficit and win the series. Which they did.

• George Ferguson's goal 47 seconds into overtime of Game 3 in the opening round against Buffalo at Memorial Auditorium in 1979, giving the Penguins a stunning first-round triumph against the Sabres.

• Mike Crombeen's double-overtime goal in the final game that allowed St. Louis to survive a best-of-five opening-round series in 1981.

• Jaromir Jagr's gutty performance near the end of Game 6 in Round 1 against New Jersey in 1999 when, hobbled by a bad groin and with the Penguins about a minute from elimination, he scored to put the game into overtime, then got the winner in a 3-2 victory. The Penguins then went on the road and claimed a berth in the second round.

• Michel Briere's overtime winner in Game 4 against Oakland in 1970. It was the first overtime goal in franchise history and clinched the team's first series win.

• All the Penguins' last-game heartbreakers against the New York Islanders. Eddie Westfall's third-period goal that was the only one by either team in Game 7 in 1975, when New York became the second team in league history to overcome a 3-0 deficit. Game 5 in 1982, when the Penguins came closer than any team did to aborting the Islanders' four-Cup dynasty, only to have John Tonelli end the game in overtime after Mike Bullard of the Penguins failed to do so on a breakaway. And, of course, David Volek's overtime winner in Game 7 in 1993, when the Penguins -- the finest team in franchise history -- had their bid for a third consecutive Cup end abruptly and painfully.

• Lemieux's eight-point performance against Philadelphia during a 10-7 victory in Game 5 of the second round in 1989. That victory gave the Penguins a 3-2 lead in the series, but a late Flyers surge generated momentum that carried them to victories in Games 6 and 7, the latter of which was won in Pittsburgh by backup goalie Ken Wregget.

• Keith Primeau's goal from the right circle in the fifth overtime of Game 4 in the second round in 2000. That gave the Flyers consecutive overtime victories in Pittsburgh, allowing them to rally from a 2-0 deficit and win the series in six.

• Stevens being knocked unconscious by a hit from Islanders defenseman Rich Pilon in the first period of Game 7 in 1993, then landing face-first on the ice and suffering horrific injuries that required extensive surgery to repair and effectively ended Stevens' run as a dominant power forward.

• Jagr's breathtaking individual effort with less than five minutes to play in Game 1 of the 1992 final, when he got by Chicago's Stephane Matteau just inside the blue line and eluded Brent Sutter and Dirk Graham before moving from the left circle toward the slot. He slipped past defenseman Frantisek Kucera and got a timely pick from Shawn McEachern before beating Eddie Belfour to cap the Penguins' comeback from being down, 4-1, and set up Lemieux's late-game winner.

• The utterly improbable goal Darius Kasparaitis, who has two goals in 83 career playoff games, scored on future Hall of Famer Dominik Hasek in OT of Game 7 during the second round against Buffalo in 2001. A goal that is, at least for the moment, the Penguins' most recent series-winner.

First published on April 6, 2008 at 12:00 am

Regular-Season Finale: Crosby is pumped up for playoffs

Sunday, April 06, 2008
By Shelly Anderson, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette



Peter Diana/ Post-Gazette
Sidney Crosby

To this point -- and things could change if they're still playing hockey at Mellon Arena weeks from now -- Sidney Crosby's third NHL season has been defined by three words.

High ankle sprain.

The debilitating injury, and the way the Penguins rallied in their captain's absence, have had a strong effect on Crosby, one that has him feeling strong in every way as the team closes the regular season today in Philadelphia and heads into the Stanley Cup playoffs Wednesday or Thursday.

"Mentally, with the injury, it was good and bad," he said yesterday. "I had two months [off]. It was awful. But at the same time I think I'm as hungry as I could be."

Crosby's right ankle bent too far as he slid into the end boards after a first-period scoring chance Jan. 18 in a 3-0 home loss against Tampa Bay. He missed the next 21 games, returned for three, starting with a March 4 game at Tampa Bay, then sat out another seven before returning for good four games and 10 days ago.

Sitting out with his first long-term injury tore the 20-year-old apart.

He was thrilled that center Evgeni Malkin blossomed and the rest of the team followed Malkin's lead to go 16-8-4 in the games he missed on its way to an Atlantic Division title. And immensely sad he missed out on the run.

"When you have an injury, when you lose, you want to help, and when you win, it [stinks] that you're not a part of it. You grow up your whole life playing on a team and trying to help each other and being happy for guys, but you want to be a part of it, too. When you're injured, you show up at the rink an hour and a half before the team to get your treatment. You're not with them. You don't travel with them. It's kind of like you're on the outside looking in, and it's not easy.

"I never took [playing] for granted. I never did. But you don't realize how much you love something until it's gone. For me, two months felt like forever."

Crosby has the drive and talent to have won the NHL scoring title and league MVP award last season and the intelligence to realize players have gone through such injuries and worse.

That didn't make it any more comfortable, given the cranky nature of a high ankle sprain.

"Each day, I never knew if I was going to wake up and it was going to be sore, even if I didn't do anything," he said. "Mentally, it's a grind. I've only played 53 games, but, with an injury like this, that's harder than playing 90 games, especially when you want to play so bad."

When he came back at Tampa, Crosby overdid it -- not with the ankle but with giddiness. So much so that he had a talk with himself.

"I remember being like, 'You've got to calm down,' " he said. "I remember thinking, 'Try to break stride once in a while. You don't have to skate full speed for 60 minutes.' I was just so eager to be a part of it."

After three games, the ankle acted up, and he pulled himself out of the lineup. In his fourth game back after that, a ramped-up, physical, 4-2 win against Philadelphia at home Wednesday, Crosby again reached for the reins.

"I found myself wanting to compete so bad," he said, "especially early on in the game. I was wasting a lot of energy trying to hit guys and things like that. [I told myself,] 'You know what? You've been through a few intense games before, so just play the same way. Settle down a bit.' "

He burned the Flyers for two goals and an assist, giving him 24 goals, 72 points this season and leaving him one goal shy of 100 for his career. He figures games like that should prepare him and the rest of the team for the postseason.

Looking back to the start of the season, Crosby feels good about the state of the mostly young team.

"We just matured," he said. "We still have a lot to learn, there's no doubt. We still have to mature more. That comes with experience.

"But throughout the season we were facing a lot of adversity. We had tons of injuries. It would have been easy to slip out of the playoffs and say we ran into problems and it just wasn't our year, but I don't think anybody accepted that.

"We won different kinds of games, too. We won games that were 6-4. We won games that were 2-1, where we had to be patient. We won physical games, too. That's all part of learning.

"We went through all that this year and, hopefully, that's something we can carry on into the playoffs."



Canadiens win, 3-1

Montreal keeps the pressure on the Penguins in the race for the No. 1 seed in the Eastern Conference by beating Toronto, 3-1, last night. It forces the Penguins to win today in Philadelphia -- the final day of the regular season.

First published on April 6, 2008 at 12:00 am

Dapper Dan Dinner: Fans pick Mazeroski's World Series HR as No. 1 sports moment

Wednesday, April 02, 2008
By Chuck Finder, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

J. Monroe Butler II / Post-Gazette

Bill Mazeroski holds an autographed ball and Pittsburgh Pirates helmet to be auctioned at the Dapper Dan Dinner at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center last night. He received the award for the all time greatest sports moment for his legendary home run blast that won the Pirates the 1960 World Series.

And your winners of Pittsburgh's Best in Sports are: '60, 66 and the '78 Steelers.

Maz's moment, the World Series-winning, Game 7, bottom-of-the-ninth, lead-off, can't-top-that home run by Bill Mazeroski Oct. 13, 1960, keeps on whipping the competition much like it beat the dreaded Yankees almost a half-century ago. From 57,125 ballots cast online and with the final imprimatur of the Dapper Dan Dinner's executive committee, that mighty swing overtook the famed Immaculate Reception and any other Super Bowl, Stanley Cup or triumphant instant in this city's esteemed 250-year past as the greatest single freeze frame in Pittsburgh's sports history.

Mario Lemieux, best known nowadays as a Penguins team owner and franchise player's landlord, was chosen as Pittsburgh's single-most stellar athlete, ahead of such luminaries as various Hall of Fame Steelers, Roberto Clemente plus homegrowns Honus Wagner and Arnold Palmer.

And the second-to-last of the '70s' Super Steelers, the 1978 edition that ambushed the Cowboys in Super Bowl XIII, was the victor in the team category.

All three Best winners were officially unveiled last night at the Dapper Dan Dinner and Sports Auction inside the David L. Lawrence Convention Center.

Maz's homer and the '60 Pirates continue to be an upset.

"I am surprised," longtime Steelers cornerback J.T. Thomas said, who expected a victory by the Immaculate Reception. "That was more than a moment. That catapulted a city. That built stadiums. That rescued the city from the exodus of the steel mills. The City of Champions, hey, come on ..."

"It is very surprising," added Mazeroski, who flew in from Florida for the event. "This is a big football town. And we're talking about 50 years, a lot of people weren't around then. I don't know how I won. I maybe would have voted for [the Immaculate Reception]."

For Mazeroski, his home-run trot keeps jogging memories nearly 48 years later. Only Toronto's Joe Carter has duplicated the feat, ending a World Series with a final-inning homer, but that was an entirely different baseball time (1993), an entirely different country (Canada).

Maz, 72, had turned 24 barely a month earlier and completed his fourth full major-league season when he strode to the plate against New York's Ralph Terry and carved a place in baseball lore. Afterward, he proceeded to play another dozen Pirates seasons, winning another World Series in 1971, the year before he retired. He went on to a Hall of Fame induction in 2001, five (of his seven total) All-Star Games, six (of eight) Golden Gloves and the reputation as one of the slickest second baseman the game has known -- his 161 double plays in 1966 still stand as the major-league record for a middle infielder. Yet his name, his visage, almost exclusively intertwined with one of his 140 career homers (in 17 seasons) and a single afternoon that completed one of American sports' greatest upsets -- beating the venerable Yankees, who outscored the Pirates in their three triumphs, 38-3.

People still ask him about that moment "every day. Even in Florida," he said. "It's not always connected to Pittsburgh, either. It's beating the Yankees."

Whereas Maz was a defensive artiste extraordinaire slightly miscast forever in footage by one homer, Lemieux was an offensive wizard whose image will be remembered for ages for, well, innumerable moments of magically making a puck dance.

J. Monroe Butler II / Post-Gazette

Mario Lemieux kisses the trophy honoring him as the the all-time greatest athlete at last night's Dapper Dan Dinner held at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center Downtown.

Sure, there was his goal where he deked both Minnesota defensemen, then the North Stars' goaltender, in the swooping, sweeping moment that turned the 1991 Stanley Cup series in favor of the formerly star-crossed Penguins. There were goals with a Quebec Nordique on his back, with his bum on Washington's ice, with the 1992 Stanley Cup Game 1 in need of Lemieux coming to the rescue. Perhaps most of all, Lemieux's legacy will remain his personal Penguins hat trick: He saved the franchise three times for Pittsburgh, as a star after being selected first overall in the 1984 draft, as a leading creditor in bankruptcy, as the owner and chairman whose group secured a new arena and future for Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and the boys.

It also won't escape his epitaph that he made glorious comebacks from back surgery, from Hodgkin's disease, from retirement after a three-year hiatus (who could forget the phrase owner-player?), from semiretirement after the lockout. Nor will it go unspoken that he crammed into his career 690 goals, 1,723 points, a 199-point 1988-89, a record two-points-per-game pace before his first unretirement, two Stanley Cups and too many memories to count. That constituted quite a turn of events for a Pittsburgh puck public habituated with the worst: a waddling mascot dying of pneumonia and young French-Canadian star Michel Briere dying after just one Penguins winter.

"Absolutely," Lemieux said when asked if he was astonished to register a victory over such elite athletic company. "Look at the names on there, some of the greatest athletes of all time in their sport. Just to be nominated alongside them -- and to win --is a great honor."

Odd, then, isn't it: A club that has so dominated the local sporting landscape and fandom snagged just one of these three Best honors?

And the Best Team winner wasn't the Steelers' inaugural Super Bowl winner ('74). It wasn't the team the Rooneys label their greatest ever ('76). It wasn't even a member of the dominating-defense generation. Rather, it was the first Steelers bunch to make use of NFL offensive changes made expressly to tie up that Steel Curtain: the '78 circus that was Terry Bradshaw to Lynn Swann and John Stallworth.

Those receivers never combined for more touchdowns than their 20 that season, when the Steelers went 14-2 for the franchise's most single-season victories until 2004. Bradshaw never threw for more touchdowns than his 28 that year or for a better full-season completion percentage than his 56.3. And the Steelers never cruised to victories by such large playoff margins as 23 points over Denver, 29 over Houston in the Three Rivers Stadium ice bowl and a 35-31 Super spanking of Dallas, which rallied with 14 points in the final 21/2 minutes to make it even look close.

"In '78, they changed the rules -- and that was the second time," Thomas said. Then-NFL commissioner "Pete Rozelle said it wasn't a good thing to have the Black and Gold in the Super Bowl every year, it wasn't good for business." But the Steelers adapted and won.

However, Thomas added, even this Best in Sports triumph was an upset to him: He, like so many others from those Steelers, believe the '76 squad was better.

"That ballclub, look at all the All-Pros that were on it," Thomas said. "Bradshaw got hurt, and [the defense] had to play. We had six straight shutouts. We got into the game, we played one coverage: bump-and-run, man-to-man. Mel [Blount] and I never went into a huddle. If they had to go [to the bathroom], we'd go with them. What happened to that team was Franco [Harris] and Rocky [Bleier] got hurt [in an playoff game at Baltimore]. If that hadn't happened, it would have been a no-brainer."

First published on April 2, 2008 at 12:00 am

Dapper Dan: Crosby, Berenato humble winners

Wednesday, April 02, 2008
By Chuck Finder, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette



J. Monroe Butler II / Post-Gazette
The Penguins' Sidney Crosby accepts sportsman of the year award last night at the annual Dapper Dan Dinner at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center, Downtown.

Sidney Crosby ducked out early last night, not so much because of any curfew by landlord Mario Lemieux, yet rather due to a couple of important appointments today: a morning skate and then a playoff-vital date with the visiting Philadelphia Flyers tonight.

But Agnus Berenato stayed, all the better to complete this night for Pittsburgh hockey, hoops and more.

Heck, Crosby and Berenato should be used to this particular ceremony by now.

The 72nd annual Dapper Dan Dinner and Sports Auction last night marked the second honor for the Penguins' record-setting captain and the firebrand coach who transformed Pitt women's basketball into an NCAA tournament regular.

They were paid tribute at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center, Crosby as back-to-back winner of the 2006 and '07 Sportsman of the Year and Berenato as '05 and now '07 Sportswoman of the Year.

"It's very humbling to be up here again this year," Crosby told the weeknight crowd of 1,000-plus. "It definitely means a lot. Obviously, I have to thank my teammates.

"It's been a tough second half for me with the high ankle sprain," Crosby added, referring to the mid-January injury that caused him to miss 21 games, play three, then sit out seven more. That limited him to 52 games thus far, with 22 goals and 69 points, but it didn't hamper the young Penguins, who went 16-8-4 in his absence. "I think our team has shown a lot of character. I can't say how proud I am to see the guys respond like they did.

"We have a young team, but I think we all realize how lucky we are to play in a city with a great sports tradition. ... I feel fortunate to be a part of that [Sportsman] group and represent the city."

Only 20, Crosby is the youngest captain in NHL history, the youngest player to score 100 points in a season and 100 each in his first two seasons, the youngest scoring champion, the youngest to be voted into an All-Star starting lineup, the youngest to win the Art Ross (scoring) and Lester B. Pearson (MVP) awards, among other achievements. Last night, he became the youngest back-to-back and multiple Sportsman winner.

Now, for him, it's back to work against the rival Flyers.

Berenato returned to Oakland a shade earlier than she hoped this week, she and the Pitt women's basketball team losing in the NCAA tournament West Region semifinal Saturday in Spokane, Wash., 72-53, to Stanford -- which since has qualified for the Final Four. She has directed Pitt to 48 victories and the program's inaugural NCAA berths the past two seasons, including the first Sweet 16 spot this year.

"I want to thank you for your blind faith in us," Berenato said to the fans and balloting public. "You ... had blind faith that something neat was about to happen. And I hope we did not disappoint.

"I want to thank everyone who voted for us, and I want to thank everyone who had the confidence in us. I accept this award on behalf of our coaches and our team. ... Ladies, it's your award, too."

Jeannette High School's Terrelle Pryor, honored among 2007 Pittsburgh Post-Gazette scholastic athletes of the year, also received last night his 2007 Parade magazine football player-of-the-year award -- and found out that in Sunday's editions he also will complete the rare double of additionally being named to the Parade All-American high school basketball team after receiving the same plaudit in football three months earlier.

First published on April 2, 2008 at 12:00 am

Steelers hardly above the fray

By Joe Starkey
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Thursday, April 3, 2008



James Harrison

"We trust that today's roster move ... will send a message that we will not tolerate this type of conduct."

Apparently, Steelers chairman Dan Rooney forgot to add "unless you're an important player" to that absurd team-released statement, issued March 20 after the Steelers cut wide receiver Cedrick Wilson, who had been charged with assaulting his former girlfriend.

The Steelers sent a message, all right, one that is affirmed every time team MVP James Harrison - charged March 8 with assaulting his girlfriend - shows up to work out at the club's South Side practice facility.

It's the same message high school, college and professional sports teams have been sending forever. Namely, that the best players are treated differently than everyone else and routinely are excused for boorish and sometimes even criminal behavior.

That's just business in the pros. Wilson is a fringe player. Harrison's a star. We understand.

It was the Steelers who dragged ethics into the discussion. They didn't have to say anything when they cut Wilson, a move that apparently freed money to sign center Justin Hartwig.

Never mind that the legal process hasn't played out, that Wilson's ex-girlfriend says the story of him walking into a restaurant and punching her was "overblown" and that the charges could very well be dropped. The Steelers were going to do the right thing.

Please.

Can we finally smash the myth that the Steelers are somehow above the fray?

The only saints in this league are the ones who play in New Orleans. The Steelers are no more righteous, and no less righteous, than any other franchise operating in a cutthroat industry where the attempt to win regularly trumps good ethics.

That goes for everyone -- the Patriots and Ravens and Cowboys and Dolphins and Bengals.

And, yes, the Steelers.

The Rooneys' reputation as decent, everyday folk is well-earned. They are good people. Professionally, their mission is to win and make money - and in pro football, that is rarely accomplished by playing nice.

If the drive to win leads the Steelers to draft a player who tested positive for marijuana in college, as offensive tackle Marvel Smith did, so be it.



Cedrick Wilson

If it means bolstering the backfield by acquiring a player with a questionable history, oh well. Two years ago, the Steelers signed Najeh Davenport, who faced a felony charge of second-degree burglary and a misdemeanor count of criminal mischief when he entered the NFL in 2002. He settled the charges by performing 100 hours of community service.

Davenport ran into more trouble last season when he pleaded not guilty to domestic violence, child endangering and unlawful restraint in a confrontation with the mother of his 5-year-old son.

The Steelers did not attempt to send a message by cutting Davenport. They are waiting out the legal process.

Entering the 2006 draft, some teams might have had misgivings about Ohio State receiver Santonio Holmes, seeing as he was the unmarried father of three children by two women. He'd also been arrested and charged with disorderly conduct after a 2003 altercation involving Ohio State football players and a group of women, one of whom reportedly sustained a broken jaw.

Holmes, held out of the opening series of the Michigan game as punishment, pleaded not guilty. Charges were dismissed when a prosecution witness reportedly could not identify Holmes as having been involved in the fight. Holmes' attorney told the Columbus Dispatch his client was trying to break up the fight.

The Steelers traded up in the first round to take Holmes, who subsequently was arrested twice in a 25-day span.

A disorderly conduct charge out of Miami was dropped. Holmes later was charged with domestic violence and assault against the mother of one of his children.

In a police affidavit, Lashae Boone alleged that Holmes was "choking (her), throwing her to the ground ... and slamming her into a door."

The Steelers did not attempt to send a message by severing ties with Holmes. They let the legal process play out. Charges were dismissed when Holmes' lawyers assured a Franklin County (Ohio) judge that Holmes was participating in counseling through the NFL.

Rooney claims the Wilson and Harrison incidents were "completely different." That hardly appears to be the case. Both are charged with hitting a woman.

If anything, the Harrison incident seemed scarier. According to a police affidavit, the 6-foot, 242-pound linebacker broke down a bathroom door, snapped his girlfriend's cell phone in half as she tried to call 911 and hit her in the face with an open hand, knocking off her glasses.

Within days, Harrison was back at the Steelers' practice facility, working out with teammates.

Get the message?


Joe Starkey is a sports writer for the Tribune-Review. He can be reached at jstarkey@tribweb.com.

Crosby scores twice, Malkin once as Penguins win division

Thursday, April 03, 2008
By Dave Molinari, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette



Peter Diana/Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Penguins Sidney Crosby celebrates his goal with Marian Hossa and Sergi Gonchar in the second period.

Winning the Atlantic Division championship wasn't the objective six or seven months ago.

Not according to Penguins coach Michel Therrien, anyway.

Or Sidney Crosby, for that matter.

Simply getting into the Stanley Cup playoffs was the goal, Therrien said. Crosby suggested that playing well was what truly counted.

That's not how Georges Laraque saw it, however. After the Penguins clinched the Atlantic title with a 4-2 victory against Philadelphia at Mellon Arena last night, Laraque said flatly that he expected nothing less from this team.

That any club with this kind of personnel couldn't have settled for second-best.

"We have the material to finish first," Laraque said. "It would have been disappointing if we didn't, because of what we did last year. Every year, the goal is to get better.

"It was a lot of hard work, but, if you look at our team, we should be first."

This is the Penguins' first division championship since they won the Northeast in 1997-98.

The victory raised the Penguins' record to 47-26-8 and positioned them to wrap up the No. 1 seed in the Eastern Conference if they can defeat the Flyers in a rematch at 3:08 p.m. Sunday in Philadelphia.

The Penguins have a two-point lead over second-place Montreal in the East; the Canadiens have two home games remaining, against Buffalo tonight and Toronto Saturday.

Should the Canadiens lose either of those games in regulation, the Penguins will have first place in the East wrapped up before they step on the ice Sunday.

Even so, Philadelphia could be competing for playoff seeding or a playoff berth. And it's clear the Penguins would like to be the team that prevents the Flyers from qualifying.

"Of course," Ryan Malone said, smiling broadly.



Peter Diana/Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Penguins Evgeni Malkin is taken down by the Flyers Randy Jones in the second period.

The Flyers, as usual, tried to batter Crosby, legally and otherwise, at every opportunity. And Crosby, as usual, responded by torching them for a fistful of points.

This time, he scored two goals and set up another, giving him 16 goals and 21 assists in 20 career games against the Flyers.

"It's been intense since I got here, so I don't think it takes [physical abuse to get involved]," Crosby said.

Seeing Flyers winger Scott Hartnell target Crosby at every opportunity apparently was enough to get Sergei Gonchar to add a physical dimension to his game. He laid Hartnell out twice on one shift during the second period.

"He's a guy who's trying to be physical," Gonchar said. "He's hitting people, so, once in a while, you have to hit him back, too."

Crosby had one of his best games of the season last night. So did the Penguins' power play, which broke out of an extended dormant stretch by scoring on four of six tries.

"The power play lately was not that good, but tonight they did the job," Therrien said. "They found a way to make it happen."

After Philadelphia took a 1-0 lead at 8:58 of the opening period, when Hartnell took a cross-ice feed from Daniel Briere and scored from inside the right circle, Gonchar countered for the Penguins at 10:24.

Jeff Carter put Philadelphia back in front at 13:13, but that was the last puck the Flyers got past Marc-Andre Fleury, and the Penguins rang up the final three goals of the game.

Crosby scored from the bottom of the right circle during a five-on-three power play at 6:26 of the second, and Evgeni Malkin got the winner at 14:33, beating Flyers goalie Martin Biron from the left dot seconds after Fleury had denied Flyers forward Sami Kapanen from close range at the other end.

Then, with only 94 seconds left in regulation, Gonchar threw the puck toward Crosby, who was to the right of the Flyers' net. Crosby reached behind his back and deflected the puck between his own legs and behind Biron.

The game was over. So was the battle for first place in the Atlantic.

It was a major step forward for this team, though not necessarily the final one.

"First place is a great feeling," Malkin said through interpreter George Birman. "But it doesn't mean anything if we're not going to show up with our best game in the playoffs."

Dave Molinari can be reached at DWMolinari@Yahoo.com.
First published on April 3, 2008 at 12:00 am

Penguins, Flyers show fighting spirit; more to come?

Thursday, April 03, 2008
By Gene Collier, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette



Pittsburgh Penguins coach Michel Therrien smiles behind Pens' Georges Laraque during the third period of a 4-2 win over the Philadelphia Flyers in NHL hockey action in Pittsburgh Wednesday, April 2, 2008. The Pens clinched the Atlantic Division Championship with the win.
(AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar)

Not five minutes after he was rightly presented the Edward J. DeBartolo Community Service Award in an earnest pregame ceremony, Penguins forward Georges Laraque was spotted performing the perceptually vital public service known as punching the nearest Flyer in the head.

The chosen Philadelphian was the estimable Riley Cote, with whom Laraque had in this long hockey season combined for 331 penalty minutes as of the opening bell, or rather faceoff, of last night's pivotal final home game.

Laraque and Cote exchanged a series of looping lefts at center ice without apparent provocation by either party, but I suspect it was essentially a matter of convenience.

Whereas the Penguins were within 60 punishing minutes of their first division title in 10 years, and whereas the Flyers seemed as likely a playoff opponent as any among the Eastern Conference rogue's gallery, there was clearly no reason to delay any further the tangible establishment of playoff hockey's mandatory "healthy dislike," the inevitable animosity created when teams keep showing up in the same rink over the course of a week or two.

Cote probably disliked it rather healthily when one of Laraque's final lefts landed with enough vinegar to send his helmet skidding down the ice like a discarded bucket. That sent both to the penalty box for five minutes, but was only the preliminary bout on a long undercard of frightfully physical play a week before the playoffs even begin.

"Yeah," Penguins center Jordan Staal said about the likelihood about a looming series' fistic potential. "It oughta be a show."

Philadelphia's Mike Knuble re-established the tone by trying to drive Jarkko Ruutu through the end boards onto Centre Avenue, and after a brief exchange of -- what's this? -- actual hockey, in which Sergei Gonchar's power-play whistler rubbed out Scott Hartnell's goal, the Flyers' Mike Richards ripped Sidney Crosby's helmet off in traffic in front of the Philadelphia net.

Richards did no actual damage other than incensing Sid's teammates, which only raised the temperature toward intolerance, especially when Jeff Carter slipped a second Flyers goal past Marc-Andre Fleury at 13:13 of the first period. Immediately, Penguins defenseman Brooks Orpik confronted Joffrey Lupul, who exchanged swings until Orpik wrestled him to the deck like some substantial rodeo animal. Two minutes later, Crosby and Lasse Kukkonen were sent to the box for roughing.

And the first period wasn't over.

The second started even hotter, with giant Flyers defenseman Braydon Coburn putting Petr Sykora on his wallet near the Penguins' bench, but that was a ballet compared to what Gonchar and Hartnell produced in the following minutes. Gonchar, whose reputation for spirited banging appears on his lengthy hockey resume somewhere south of taxidermy, laid Hartnell out like carpet in the offensive zone. Seconds later, Hartnell chased Gonchar the length of the ice, caught him against the end boards, tumbled to the ice, and got a skate to the bridge of the nose for all his trouble.

The Flyers' bench went crazy, to no evident impact.

After Crosby found himself in a Coburn bear hug, Coburn and Hartnell went to the box together. Nineteen seconds later, Crosby buried Gonchar's cross-ice pass for a 2-2 tie and a useful reminder, one would think, that you can't keep taking penalties without consequence.

It was lost on Hartnell apparently, who dropped Orpik to the ice behind the Penguins' net and appeared to be attempting some kind of invasive surgery in the guise of trying to fish the puck from beneath the Penguins' defender. They both got to their feet and punched each other in the head.

Sensing any trends?

When James Dowd went off for hooking later in the period, Evgeni Malkin made the Flyers pay through the metaphorical nose rather than any actual nose, beating Martin Biron for a 3-2 Pittsburgh lead.

"This is a winnable hockey game," Flyers coach John Stevens was preaching in Philadelphia's dressing room prior to the third period. "We're down a goal, let's get out there and better use our energy between the whistles and not worry about the calls that are made or not made and use our energy to win the game."

But the Flyers' energy thereafter mostly produced more of the same.

Gene Collier can be reached at gcollier@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1283.
First published on April 3, 2008 at 12:00 am

Playoffs to define Penguins, Therrien

By Mike Prisuta
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Tuesday, April 1, 2008



NEW YORK - MARCH 31: Sidney Crosby #87 of the Pittsburgh Penguins waits for the faceoff against the New York Rangers on March 31, 2008 at Madison Square Garden in New York City. The Rangers defeated the Penguins 2-1 in overtime. (Photo by Bruce Bennett/Getty Images)


The Penguins reached 100 points for the fifth time in franchise history with a 2-1, overtime loss to the New York Rangers on Monday night.

It's an achievement that might be worth celebrating until you recall what happened on the previous four occasions.

In 1992-93, an anticipated third consecutive Stanley Cup run was derailed in the second round of the playoffs, an upset as devastating as it was unforeseen for a 119-point team that finished first overall in the regular season.

In 1993-94, the Pens finished third among the NHL's 26 teams with 101 points, then checked out of the playoffs in the opening round in six games against Washington.

In 1995-96, the Pens made it to the Eastern Conference final after finishing fourth overall with 102 points. But it was another Game 7 home-ice loss, this time to Florida, that defined the season.

Then, there was last season, when an out-of-nowhere, 105-point effort became harder to remember as Ottawa was in the process of eliminating the Penguins in five first-round games.

See where we're headed here?

It's the playoffs that make reputations and define legacies.

So, if you're among those pondering whether Michel Therrien ought to be named coach of the year, whether Evgeni Malkin deserves to be declared the league's MVP or whether Sidney Crosby still can be considered the best player on the planet, be advised:

None of that will matter once the puck is dropped April 9 or 10.

For the first time since 2000-01, the Pens will enter the playoffs with legitimate expectations -- which means, this time, they have something to lose.

Along those lines, Therrien potentially has more at stake than most.

He was given a one-year contract extension at the conclusion of last season, when a first-round exit was accepted as disappointing but, at the same time, perceived as understandable given the circumstances.

This time, the dynamics have changed, and the bar is raised, particularly since the Penguins acquired Marian Hossa.

We still haven't seen exactly what that will mean as far as altering the balance of power in the Eastern Conference, but that laser Hossa fired Sunday past Henrik Lundqvist offered a glimpse of what might be possible.

Whether the Penguins win the conference, they have been a factor in the quest for the top spot into the regular season's final week. That means they have positioned themselves as contenders, if not the favorite, in the East.

And that being the case, another one-and-done postseason wouldn't be nearly as easy to swallow.

A second consecutive early exit wouldn't necessarily doom Therrien, but it might induce upper management to begin pondering whether there was someone else better suited to lead the Penguins to the championship.

And once a process such as that begins, the conclusions reached often are inevitable, if not immediate.


Mike Prisuta is a columnist for the Tribune-Review. He can be reached at mprisuta@tribweb.com or 412-320-7923.