Think 50 different former players and coaches can show up before every home playoff game?
Team brass may want to look into it.
After many of the Pittsburgh Penguins' franchise legends were introduced prior to last night's final regular season home game at Mellon Arena, beginning with early favorites who played in the arena's first game like Ken Schinkel and Les Binkley all the way down to the line to the greatest player in franchise history (and it's current co-owner) Mario Lemieux, the Pens then went out, fed off that energy, and appropriately laid a woodshed beating on their opponents in the only true way the Pittsburgh franchise should have -- by blitzkreging the bewildered New York Islanders offensively and tallying seven times in route to a 7-3 victory.
It was a memorable and enjoyable night all around at the ol' Igloo last night for sure, but what can't be surprising is the name who imprinted the greatest stamp on the scene.
#87.
Sidney Crosby scored his 49th goal of the season and added 3 assists for 4 points in the rout.
One of those points was his 500th of his career, making him the third youngest player in NHL history to hit that mark (at 22 years, 244 days), behind only his landlord, Lemieux, and Wayne Gretzky.
It was just meant to be for the black and gold last night, and the Islanders should have figured that out from the start when defenseman Brooks Orpik took a shot from the point that sailed through a mass of bodies and found the top corner behind Isles' netminder Martin Biron just 23 seconds into the game.
After Alex Goligoski went top shelf, short side past Biron to complete a tic-tac-toe passing play on the man-advantage at the 5 minute mark, it seemed like the rout was on.
But New York got a power play goal of their own about 3 minutes later on a deflection by forward Matt Moulson to keep the game close.
The same sequence played out again later in the period.
Evgeni Malkin scored on a breakaway to restore the Pens' 2-goal cushion only to see it shrink to 1 again a few minutes later on a tally by Islanders' forward Kyle Okposo, but Crosby made it 4-2 before the first period ended by lashing a slapshot past Biron through a screen from about 45 feet.
After letting 4 of 10 pucks go by him, New York coach Scott Gordon probably felt it was best to try and keep the Penguins from scoring in the double digits, so he promptly replaced Biron with Dwayne Roloson to start the 2nd period, and the Islanders got a little lift from that when Josh Bailey scored on another deflection past Pens' netminder Marc-Andre Fleury just past the 6-minute mark of the second to keep the Pens' from waltzing away from their pesky opponents.
As it turned out, though, they were simply delaying the inevitable.
The Pens' scored the next 3 tallies, the first by Bill Guerin on the power play when a Crosby shot went off him and past Roloson.
Everyone in the building thought Crosby had scored his 50th on the play, and the goal was initally awarded to him, but after the game, the marker was appropriately credited to Billy G -- his 20th -- when both he and Crosby acknowledged the puck when off the pants of #13.
"There's no way I would ever want a goal that isn't mine," the humble Crosby said afterwards.
Tyler Kennedy piled on past the 16 minute mark of the second by lashing a slapshot past Roloson through a screen, and Guerin scored again in the 3rd to close out the scoring and send everyone at Mellon home not just with a commemorative ticket and a lot of memories, but a rousing win and a big 2 points in the standings.
Those 2 points, by the way, came in handy when the New Jersey Devils lost 3-2 to the Florida Panthers, and thus, lifted Pittsburgh back into a tie for the Atlantic Division lead with the Devils.
Both teams have 99 points with 2 games left but, of course, the Devils still hold the tiebreaker (after # of wins) by having swept the season series from Pittsburgh.
Is anyone else agonozied by not being able to take a SINGLE game from those guys this year? That could make all the difference right now.
Of course, so could any other one win -- or even one point -- throughout the year, so it's not worth getting too upset about. The Penguins are better off focusing on their play and buidling off last night's victory. They still have some issues to work on in their own zone after giving the Islanders 35 shots, but Marc-Andre Fleury played well in stopping 32 of them and giving his team a chance to move forward positively into the weekend.
The Devils' last two games are at home, on Saturday night against the Islanders and on Sunday against the Buffalo Sabres. The Sabres, by the way, were missing regulars Tomas Vanek and Tim Connelly and rested goaltender Ryan Miller last night against the Boston Bruins and promptly lost 3-1 to their division rivals.
Pittsburgh, of course, goes to the road for their final 2 contests against the Thrashers in Atlanta on Saturday, then to New York to see the Islanders again and close the season on Sunday.
With his effort last night, Crosby now has a 1-goal cushion on Steven Stamkos -- who also scored last night -- and Alexander Ovechkin for the Rocket Richard trophy as the NHL's leading goal scorer. Both the Lightning and Capitals also have 2 games to play.
Interestingly, Crosby also has now asserted himself as a potential, but still darkhorse, candidate to swipe away the Art Ross trophy as the NHL's top point getter from either Ovechkin (now only 2 points ahead of him) or the current leader, Henrik Sedin, who had an assist last night but is now only 4 ahead of Crosby with 1 game for the Canucks left to play on Saturday against the Calgary Flames.
The Canucks have nothing to play for -- their playoff seeding in the Western Conference is set -- so it's possible he could be rested for the playoffs and sit out Saturday's game, but overall, I think that's unlikely. Just like I feel it's unlikely Ovechkin will sit out either of the Capitals' final two contests, despite Washington also having nothing to play for.
Those races -- and the Atlantic Division race -- are going down to the wire.
The Pens' need to win Saturday to keep their chances of taking the title alive. If the Devils go up on them 2 points after the teams' respective games that night, New Jersey will capture the Atlantic Crown and lock the Penguins into the 4th seed.
Pittsburgh might be catching a little bit of a break from the schedule maker again that night, since the Thrashers have to play in Washington tonight, before flying all the way home for their finale against the Pens' Saturday. Atlanta is pretty banged up right now, too. We'll see if any of that helps out the Penguins.
More over the weekend as all these races finish and the Penguins find out who they open up the 2010 Stanley Cup playoffs against next week.
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