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Return of Stanley (2016 Penguins) · Pittsburgh Sports Memories

0:00
SPEAKER_01: Hi everybody, welcome to the Pittsburgh Sports Memories Podcast.
0:03
SPEAKER_01: I am Tim Hannon.
0:04
SPEAKER_00: And I'm Steve Werger.
0:06
SPEAKER_01: And as always, we are going to delve into a Pittsburgh sports uh memory from the past.
0:13
SPEAKER_01: Today on the show, we are going to be covering the 2016 Pittsburgh Penguins Championship Run.
0:34
SPEAKER_01: Anytime we cover a topic, especially a championship season, we we always delve into sort of the background leading up to that season.
0:44
SPEAKER_01: And and I think in this case, it's really relevant, maybe more relevant than anything any other time we've done this, because um, Steve, there's been 16 uh championships won collectively by the three professional sports teams here in Pittsburgh.
1:00
SPEAKER_01: And I'm not sure that any of them are quite like the one that the Penguins won in 2016 because I I don't know if any of the other teams were in total disarray before the season started and even into the season.
1:14
SPEAKER_01: You know, typically when a team wins a championship, they're they're building towards it for a few years.
1:19
SPEAKER_01: And and it doesn't just sort of come out of nowhere.
1:23
SPEAKER_01: And maybe the 1960 Pirates might be the only other team that is even in the same neighborhood in terms of you know, that wasn't expected and they weren't building towards that for years and years.
1:35
SPEAKER_01: But the there's definitely a a unique situation here.
1:38
SPEAKER_01: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
1:39
SPEAKER_00: Or the 1975 Pittsburgh Triangles.
1:42
SPEAKER_01: That team definitely came out of nowhere.
1:44
SPEAKER_01: I was not counting them in the 16 World Championships.
1:47
SPEAKER_01: So in the in the uh so so let's let's talk about how we got here.
1:54
SPEAKER_01: So so in the mid-2000s, the Penguins are a struggling franchise.
1:59
SPEAKER_01: Uh they're really bad.
2:00
SPEAKER_01: There's not a lot of a lot of light at the end of the tunnel.
2:04
SPEAKER_01: Um but you know the the one of the things in sports, when you're bad, they give you high draft picks, and you're supposed to be able to rebuild with those high draft picks.
2:12
SPEAKER_01: And with some good management and admittedly a little bit of luck, uh the penguins are able to turn those high draft picks into this core of star players.
2:21
SPEAKER_01: Uh Sidney Crosby, uh Evgeny Malkin, Chris Latang, and the goaltender Mark-Andre Fleury.
2:28
SPEAKER_01: And with that core and some secondary pieces, they're able to go from worst to first.
2:34
SPEAKER_01: They make the Stanley Cup finals in 2008, and then they win the Stanley Cup in 2009.
2:40
SPEAKER_01: Um we did an episode about that, that cup winning team.
2:43
SPEAKER_01: Very exciting run to beat the Red Wings in seven games.
2:47
SPEAKER_01: And when they win that first cup, Crosby is 21 years old at that point.
2:53
SPEAKER_01: And none of those other guys that I mentioned are are much older than that.
2:57
SPEAKER_01: And so at that point, the future's just so bright.
3:00
SPEAKER_01: Uh, you have this this young energetic coach, Dan Biosma.
3:03
SPEAKER_01: Uh, you have this this very smart general manager, Ray Shiro, who had uh taken that core and put all these great supporting players like Jordan Stahl and Bill Guerin and Sergei Gonchar.
3:16
SPEAKER_01: And and you just thought, man, the sky's the limit.
3:20
SPEAKER_01: How many, how many championships are we gonna win?
3:23
SPEAKER_01: Uh and it doesn't work out that way.
3:25
SPEAKER_01: The next few years are are rough, primarily, primarily due to Crosby having the concussion injuries.
3:31
SPEAKER_01: And when he finally returns, they have just an absolutely disastrous playoff loss to the Flyers in 2012.
3:37
SPEAKER_01: So disastrous, in fact, that we did an entire episode on it that we titled Series from Hell.
3:42
SPEAKER_01: Um and the main takeaway, we talked about it in that episode, the the main takeaway from that series is it kind of exposes the Penguins as I think petulant and and undisciplined.
3:54
SPEAKER_01: Um they were a bunch of guys that were really talented, but they they unraveled easily.
4:00
SPEAKER_01: And I I that label kind of carries into the following seasons, and and the penguins don't do much to shake that label.
4:08
SPEAKER_01: And and Steve, I don't know, was that a fair label?
4:11
SPEAKER_00: Well, then they got James James Neal definitely fit that label.
4:15
SPEAKER_00: Like he always won like anybody with a flyers uniform on, he seemed to want to fight.
4:19
SPEAKER_00: And uh Mulkin definitely, you know.
4:22
SPEAKER_00: He's he wasn't quite I don't think he quite turned into like the the best, he's probably the best all-around defend like defensive, offensive, like Russian player to ever play the game, and I don't think he had quite gotten there yet.
4:36
SPEAKER_00: So I mean it's just kind of was something under Balsma, like Balsma, like I guess maybe because they were stars, maybe didn't you know push them as hard or discipline them as hard as maybe he should have.
4:49
SPEAKER_00: So I think that kind of played into it too.
4:52
SPEAKER_00: You know, you gotta have the respect of the players, and there does seem to be, like I've said this before, I think there's to be seems to be a shelf life to hockey coaches for whatever reason.
5:02
SPEAKER_00: So I mean there was a year in there too where like everybody got hurt, like Crosby got hurt and Mulkin was hurt, and then they lost in the second round, I think, to Tampa Bay.
5:13
SPEAKER_00: But they still made the playoffs and made the second round, you know, but they they kind of they still Jordan Stall at that point.
5:19
SPEAKER_00: So I mean it definitely was things were trending to where they were just kind of be one of those, like they won one, but they never really won another one.
5:28
SPEAKER_02: Right.
5:28
SPEAKER_00: And other teams were winning back to backs in between that, like the Kings and the Blackhawks, you know.
5:34
SPEAKER_01: Right.
5:35
SPEAKER_01: Right.
5:35
SPEAKER_01: They were de they were definitely being surpassed by those teams.
5:39
SPEAKER_01: Uh in 2013, they make a bunch of deals at the trade deadline.
5:43
SPEAKER_01: They get Hall of Famer Jerome McGinla, among others.
5:46
SPEAKER_01: And they they make a run to the conference finals, but there they get Lamb based by Boston.
5:50
SPEAKER_01: That's the series where they only scored two goals all series.
5:54
SPEAKER_01: Uh the other thing that happened during that 2013 run was Marc-Andre Fleury loses his starting job.
6:01
SPEAKER_01: Uh and and ultimately he he ends up seeing a sports psychologist to kind of get his head right.
6:06
SPEAKER_01: So he's having some some tough times um around this around this time as well.
6:12
SPEAKER_01: 2014, they're in the second round of the playoffs and they have a three games to one lead on the New York Rangers.
6:18
SPEAKER_01: But once again, they come unglued and they they blow that series.
6:21
SPEAKER_00: I remember that series.
6:23
SPEAKER_00: I remember thinking like even when they had a three games to one that they had been kind of lucky, like they had gotten some lucky goals and stuff and just had kind of been scoring at the right times.
6:31
SPEAKER_00: And I I kind of thought the Rangers were at least equal to them.
6:34
SPEAKER_00: And then I I really wasn't like too shocked when the Rangers came back and won that.
6:39
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, well it wasn't it wasn't like the Penguins were way better.
6:42
SPEAKER_01: I think it was more just that they had a three games to one lead.
6:45
SPEAKER_01: All you had to do was win one of the last three.
6:46
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
6:47
SPEAKER_01: And and they just they couldn't do it, yeah.
6:50
SPEAKER_01: And by the time it got to game seven, I think the worst part about that was by the time it got to game seven, like you you knew they were gonna like they was just they were gonna lose.
6:58
SPEAKER_01: Like you just knew they were gonna lose.
7:00
SPEAKER_01: And because that's the way things went under Balsma.
7:03
SPEAKER_01: And and that was really the loss that that did everything in.
7:07
SPEAKER_01: After that loss, uh the the team owners, Mario Lemieux and Ron Burkle, and and the team CEO, David Morehouse, they get together and they decide, you know what, it's it's time to make a change in terms of the general manager and the head coach.
7:21
SPEAKER_01: And that was it was like it was kind of hard to believe it it had come to that point because five years earlier, they're hoisting the Stanley Cup.
7:28
SPEAKER_01: You know, Hiro, I mean, remember that whole anytime Hero would make a trade that over all over social media would be like, in Hiro we trust.
7:36
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
7:36
SPEAKER_01: You know, he was he was the smartest guy in hockey.
7:39
SPEAKER_01: And then Biosma, um, Biosma to this day is is still the Penguins' all-time winningest coach.
7:47
SPEAKER_01: And the all at five and a half seasons, their longest tenured coach in the 50, what, 55-year history of the team or whatever?
7:56
SPEAKER_01: Five and a half years.
7:56
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, he's the he's the longest tenured coach.
7:59
SPEAKER_01: And you know, what one of the things the Penguins have never had is like stability.
8:04
SPEAKER_01: You know, you look at the Steelers with three head coaches since 1969 and the same general manager for the last two decades.
8:10
SPEAKER_01: The the Penguins have never even sniffed that level of stability.
8:14
SPEAKER_01: And you just thought that the Shiro Bausma era was gonna be that like long-term stability.
8:19
SPEAKER_01: Like this guy's this is gonna be our team for a long time.
8:22
SPEAKER_01: And by 2014, like it's clear that that that's not gonna work anymore.
8:28
SPEAKER_01: And so it was kind of shocking that it got to that point, but I think everybody, you know, fans and and media and obviously ownership agreed that it needed to get there.
8:37
SPEAKER_01: But they they do make a curious decision, though.
8:42
SPEAKER_01: They they fire Shiro, um, but then they just kind of like punt on Balsma.
8:48
SPEAKER_01: Like they don't say he's fired, they say, well, Shiro is fired, and the next GM can name his own head coach.
8:54
SPEAKER_01: And people are like, So does that mean it's not Balsma?
8:57
SPEAKER_01: And they're like, Well, the next GM can name his own head coach.
9:00
SPEAKER_00: And it's like, what?
9:01
SPEAKER_00: So I guess they left it open to keeping Balsma.
9:04
SPEAKER_00: But I remember I always just thought Balsma was gone.
9:05
SPEAKER_00: It was just a matter of time.
9:06
SPEAKER_00: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
9:07
SPEAKER_01: I think everybody, everybody knew that, but they didn't officially say that.
9:11
SPEAKER_01: And uh Steve, I don't know.
9:13
SPEAKER_01: It it reminds me of like the scene in office space where the they they they lay off the one guy, but they don't tell him he's fired.
9:21
SPEAKER_01: They just quit giving him a paycheck.
9:22
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, they just figured it'd work its way out naturally.
9:24
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
9:25
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, because they don't like confrontation.
9:26
SPEAKER_00: So you told him it's fired.
9:27
SPEAKER_00: No, we just fix the glitch.
9:29
SPEAKER_01: It'll work its way out naturally.
9:31
SPEAKER_01: That's honestly what it reminded me of.
9:33
SPEAKER_01: And it it's it's like Cleveland Brown-esque like way to run your organization.
9:38
SPEAKER_01: That was very bewildering that that's what they chose to do.
9:42
SPEAKER_01: So, okay, so now who's gonna be the new GM?
9:46
SPEAKER_01: And and there was a list of candidates.
9:48
SPEAKER_01: Um, I think probably at the top of that list was uh Jason Botterill, who just got fired by Buffalo.
9:54
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, who yeah, who who just recently um lost his job as the Buffalo GM.
9:59
SPEAKER_01: But back then he was the assistant penguins GM.
10:02
SPEAKER_01: And his big his big claim to fame was he was the cap guy for the Penguins, and that was a big deal because remember, the cap was the cap had only started in 2005.
10:12
SPEAKER_01: So teams were still figuring out how to use it, and he did a really good job figuring out how you kept that core of star players, how you put guys around them, how you still manage the cap.
10:21
SPEAKER_01: So he was a young, sort of up-and-coming uh you know, name, and he was right in the Penguins front office already.
10:29
SPEAKER_01: Uh Tom Fitzgerald, who was also in the Penguins Front Office, was another candidate.
10:33
SPEAKER_01: Um, most fans remember Tom Fitzgerald when he played for the Florida Panthers and scored the game-winning goal in game seven of the 96 conference finals.
10:42
SPEAKER_01: So that was kind of odd.
10:43
SPEAKER_01: It would have been like hiring Francisco Cabrera to be the Pirates manager.
10:46
SPEAKER_01: Uh, but you know, he was he was a strong candidate.
10:49
SPEAKER_01: Pierre Maguire.
10:50
SPEAKER_01: Remember that?
10:51
SPEAKER_01: He was a candidate.
10:52
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
10:52
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
10:53
SPEAKER_01: So Pierre Maguire, most people know from NBC, he's the guy that sits between the benches and and gives the sort of on-ice commentary for the NBC games.
11:01
SPEAKER_01: Uh but he had a he had a history with the Penguins.
11:03
SPEAKER_01: He was an assistant on that 91 and 92 cup games.
11:06
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
11:06
SPEAKER_01: Uh he was close with Mario.
11:08
SPEAKER_00: I think he had hair back then.
11:09
SPEAKER_01: I think he did.
11:10
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
11:11
SPEAKER_01: Uh and then uh the Tampa Bay and Nashville assistant DMs were also candidates.
11:16
SPEAKER_01: Uh and so kind of the thinking was they're probably gonna go with, you know, so when you talk about like the assistant DMs on Tampa Bay and Nashville, those were teams that were doing well.
11:28
SPEAKER_01: And, you know, you were thinking they were gonna go with like the next guy, the next, you know, star DM, the young guy that hasn't got his chance yet.
11:37
SPEAKER_01: Uh instead they hired a guy named Kim Rutherford.
11:40
SPEAKER_01: And that's another curious decision.
11:43
SPEAKER_01: So I think we all know what where Kim Rutherford is now, but let's talk about it.
11:48
SPEAKER_00: I remember I didn't think much of them when they hired.
11:50
SPEAKER_00: I thought, okay, uh, like really?
11:52
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
11:53
SPEAKER_01: Well, and that's what a lot of people thought.
11:55
SPEAKER_01: I mean, uh, and honestly, yeah, it was it was not a popular decision.
11:59
SPEAKER_01: I mean, so so let's talk about Jim Rutherford.
12:01
SPEAKER_01: So the good uh the good on Jim Rutherford's resume, he he had spent 20 years as the general manager and the team president of the Carolina Hurricanes.
12:10
SPEAKER_01: That dated all the way back to when they were still the Hartford Whalers.
12:14
SPEAKER_01: And that was a franchise that was kind of a nothing franchise.
12:18
SPEAKER_01: And and when he was the GM, they won a Stanley Cup in 2006.
12:23
SPEAKER_01: So that was a big deal winning a Stanley Cup with a franchise like the Carolina Hurricanes.
12:27
SPEAKER_01: Uh he also had a history with the Penguins, he was their starting goaltender in the early 70s, so he had played here.
12:33
SPEAKER_01: Um so that was the good.
12:35
SPEAKER_01: The bad I want to be careful how I say this.
12:39
SPEAKER_01: He he but he he came across as like super, super old.
12:44
SPEAKER_01: And and he wasn't.
12:45
SPEAKER_01: He was only 65.
12:46
SPEAKER_01: He was like one of those guys that like was 65, but like looks and talks like he's 85.
12:51
SPEAKER_00: Well, he he is a little on the crotchety side.
12:54
SPEAKER_01: He yeah, he just he just he kind of talks like these young people today.
12:58
SPEAKER_01: Like he didn't say that, but that was kind of how he sounded.
13:01
SPEAKER_00: My favorite like Jim Rutherford story is there There's a guy, I don't know if he works for the trivia anymore, Rob Rossi.
13:08
SPEAKER_00: Does he I don't anybody work for Rob Rossi?
13:10
SPEAKER_00: I think he worked for DK Sports or he doesn't work for the trivia anymore, I don't think.
13:14
SPEAKER_01: He got into an argument with him in an elevator.
13:16
SPEAKER_00: Yes, and Rob Rossi's family owns the Dairy Queen on Banksville Road.
13:20
SPEAKER_00: Okay, and Jim Rutherford's like, why don't you go back to serving ice cream?
13:24
SPEAKER_00: Because I actually only know that because I saw like Rob Rossi in there one time.
13:28
SPEAKER_00: I was like, oh, there's Rob Rossi.
13:29
SPEAKER_00: And he literally was serving ice, so maybe you listen to Jim like, oh, better go back and if you want a blizzard.
13:36
SPEAKER_01: So yeah, so it was like, and again, you thought it kind of goes into the crotchety old man.
13:41
SPEAKER_00: That's like such a crotchety old man thing to say.
13:44
SPEAKER_01: And again, you you kind of expected them to go with like the up-and-coming analytics genius assistant DM that's gonna finally get his chance and make his you know big name on the penguins and their stars.
13:58
SPEAKER_01: And they go with sort of an old retread.
14:01
SPEAKER_01: And the other thing, you know, so he had won the Stanley Cup in Carolina, but they hadn't made the playoffs.
14:06
SPEAKER_01: This is 2014.
14:07
SPEAKER_01: They hadn't made the playoffs since 2009 when they had they had gotten swept out of the conference finals by Pittsburgh.
14:13
SPEAKER_01: Uh and during that time, he had been criticized a lot in Carolina for mismanaging their cap.
14:19
SPEAKER_01: So again, is this guy really know what he's doing?
14:22
SPEAKER_01: And so they they bring they have an introductory press conference, which by all accounts is a is just a total disaster.
14:29
SPEAKER_01: Because he gets up there at the podium, and the first thing he says is he's only going to be there like two or three years.
14:36
SPEAKER_01: And like what?
14:38
SPEAKER_01: Like he's only gonna be like he's like, yeah, I'm only gonna do this job for two or three years.
14:42
SPEAKER_01: Well, he is 65.
14:43
SPEAKER_01: Well, but but why would you h so when do you ever hire somebody?
14:47
SPEAKER_01: You know, DMs usually talk about five-year plans in the future, and he's he has a one-year plan.
14:52
SPEAKER_01: He's talking about retiring.
14:53
SPEAKER_00: One year plan was file for social security, I guess.
15:01
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and and and filing for social security and and going to the old folks' home.
15:06
SPEAKER_01: And and and you know, the the the presumably the idea was he was going to you know, they were going to keep Bottero on as the assistant, and that that that Bottero would eventually replace him, or maybe Fitzgerald, or maybe Bill Guerin, who was also in the front office.
15:21
SPEAKER_01: But but again, so you're hiring a guy just temporarily?
15:24
SPEAKER_01: And and then the other thing he says is that you know Bosma is indeed fired.
15:29
SPEAKER_01: Uh, but that he didn't even meet with Bosma, he just went based off information that was given to him.
15:35
SPEAKER_00: So he didn't even like call him or anything, like hey.
15:38
SPEAKER_00: Apparently not.
15:38
SPEAKER_00: It's like Balsam picked up the phone, hey, I'm fired.
15:41
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
15:42
SPEAKER_01: So that whole thing about the cam picks his own coach was apparently nonsense.
15:46
SPEAKER_01: I I thought that was so that so that was, yeah.
15:49
SPEAKER_01: I mean, the for Balsma needed to go.
15:53
SPEAKER_01: I think we can all agree on that.
15:54
SPEAKER_01: It was his time, his time was up.
15:56
SPEAKER_01: But he gave a lot of good years to the franchise, and I just thought that was a crummy way to treat him on his way out, the way that they handled that.
16:02
SPEAKER_01: Um, and that was just unlike Mario, it was unlike the the Penguins, it's not how they usually do business.
16:08
SPEAKER_01: So that was discouraging, and then to have then to have Jim Rutherford stand up there and be like, yeah, I'm only gonna be here for two years.
16:14
SPEAKER_01: It like it didn't inspire a lot of confidence.
16:17
SPEAKER_01: So he's the GM.
16:19
SPEAKER_01: Nobody's excited about that.
16:21
SPEAKER_01: Now they have to hire a head coach.
16:22
SPEAKER_01: They hire a guy named Mike Johnston.
16:25
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, they this was always an odd hire.
16:27
SPEAKER_00: I know, yeah.
16:28
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
16:28
SPEAKER_01: So so Mike Johnston, what was his previous job, Steve?
16:32
SPEAKER_00: He was a coach of a junior hockey team in Portland.
16:35
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
16:36
SPEAKER_00: But he he had won like, what is it, Calder Cups or he had won Calder Cups with them, but but like what I had heard was like that, like I think they were like I don't know if they were Vancouver or Chicago, like they would just like send all like their players down, like players that were bare so like he would basically fill like almost an NHL team at the end of the season because so I mean I don't know how good he really was at developing young talent, but it was definitely definitely an odd odd choice, like yeah.
17:08
SPEAKER_01: To put to put a junior hockey coach in charge of Cindy Crosby and Evgeny Malgin on uh and especially in charge of a situation where they needed to reshape the culture of the franchise.
17:22
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, for whatever reason he didn't seem like the I don't know.
17:25
SPEAKER_00: I I I don't know what they were I they must have saw some in them.
17:29
SPEAKER_01: I I guess.
17:30
SPEAKER_01: I mean and and the other thing that we have to say about Mike Johnson, again, I I'm I'm not young anymore, so I'm not uh criticizing anybody's age.
17:38
SPEAKER_01: But he was 57 years old.
17:39
SPEAKER_01: And the only reason I bring that up is because I could see if they hired a junior hockey coach that was like 31, you know, and like oh yeah, well he's he's he's a junior hockey coach because he's like up and coming through the ranks.
17:52
SPEAKER_01: So kind of like like uh Sean McVay or like for the Rams, like a coach like that.
17:56
SPEAKER_01: I could see that kind of higher.
17:58
SPEAKER_01: But Mike Johnston was 57.
18:00
SPEAKER_01: He this he was not up and coming, he was a junior hockey coach who they just decided to bring to the NHL, and he didn't inspire a lot of confidence either.
18:09
SPEAKER_01: I mean, he he like he just looked like office worker number four from Central Casting, you know, and and then the other thing that they did was they hired uh Rick Tocket as an assistant coach, and I apparently it was sort of a package deal.
18:24
SPEAKER_01: Um the the other guy that they were trying to get or that there was rumors of them getting was the guy that went to Vancouver, and supposedly maybe the reason he didn't want to come to Pittsburgh was because they were gonna make him pair with Tocket.
18:37
SPEAKER_01: Um I nobody knows if that's true or not.
18:40
SPEAKER_01: But Rick Tocket, of course, um had been on the Penguins 92 Cup team, had a lot of history in Pittsburgh, was an NHL head coach, um, but he had been out of the league for five years.
18:51
SPEAKER_01: He was announcing with Philadelphia, I think.
18:54
SPEAKER_01: So he'd been out of the league for a while too.
18:56
SPEAKER_00: And I I again, like you said, Steve, it was an odd higher I think Rick Tocket ended up being, you know, not the fortune, but Rick Tackett ended up being the right person for that assistant job, though.
19:07
SPEAKER_00: They at least got the assistant coach, right?
19:08
SPEAKER_01: They got that right, and that ends up being key to the to the run we're gonna talk about.
19:13
SPEAKER_01: Yeah because he stays on.
19:14
SPEAKER_01: But Mike Johnston, I don't know what they were thinking.
19:17
SPEAKER_01: Maybe they were thinking as a junior hockey coach he could like mold the young guys and and talk it would kind of add that grit that they were missing.
19:24
SPEAKER_00: I don't I don't know, but well he just seemed very generic.
19:26
SPEAKER_00: Like he didn't he just I don't I don't know what they were thinking.
19:31
SPEAKER_00: I I like it wasn't like like you said, like a fun like it wasn't like a Tarion where he's gonna like Tarrion was older, but Tarrion would, you know, cuss you out in bilingual, you know.
19:41
SPEAKER_00: I mean this guy just didn't seem to like he seemed to like you know kind of be a little maybe maybe a little too even keeled.
19:48
SPEAKER_00: Maybe this team needed somebody with a little bit more like force, like leadership than this guy was offering.
19:55
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
19:55
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's exactly right.
19:57
SPEAKER_01: I mean between so they have the this generic junior hockey coach and this, you know, retread kind of older l sounding GM.
20:08
SPEAKER_01: And I think I think both of those hires were widely panned by the media, by fans.
20:13
SPEAKER_01: I don't know anybody that was like, yeah, this is this is what's gonna turn everything around.
20:18
SPEAKER_01: And um, you know, when they when they go into the 2015 season, um it it doesn't go well.
20:25
SPEAKER_01: At the end of the season, they uh the penguins they're they're kind of in that like bottom tier playoff grouping.
20:33
SPEAKER_01: And and they had six games left at the end of the season.
20:36
SPEAKER_01: They only needed to win one of those to clinch a playoff spot.
20:39
SPEAKER_01: And they lose the first five of those last six.
20:43
SPEAKER_01: So now they come down to the final game of the season to clinch the playoff spot against the worst team in the league, Buffalo.
20:49
SPEAKER_01: They do win that to get into the playoffs, but then they get obliterated in the first round by the Rangers.
20:56
SPEAKER_01: Uh that series isn't very long, and it ends on an overtime goal by a guy named Carl Haglin, who we'll talk about later.
21:02
SPEAKER_01: Uh and and and to be fair to that 2015 team, that they had a lot of injuries that year.
21:07
SPEAKER_01: Uh, so that didn't help.
21:09
SPEAKER_01: But Rutherford kind of made things worse.
21:11
SPEAKER_01: He he messed up the cap situation and they ended up having to play with five defensemen for a while at the end of the season.
21:17
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
21:17
SPEAKER_01: And because they weren't allowed to call anybody up because they had like used their allotment of the cap or whatever.
21:22
SPEAKER_01: Jeez.
21:23
SPEAKER_01: So that that was pretty bad.
21:24
SPEAKER_01: And then the the midseason trade he made, he traded a first-round pick to the Edmonton Oilers for David Perron, who was a total bust as a penguin.
21:34
SPEAKER_01: So that was a waste of a first-round pick for David Perron.
21:38
SPEAKER_01: So so yeah, so now we're heading into the the the 2015 16 season.
21:43
SPEAKER_01: And there's really not a lot of optimism in Pittsburgh.
21:47
SPEAKER_01: Um the stars aren't living up to their expectations.
21:50
SPEAKER_01: The the new coach and the new GM both look like busts.
21:54
SPEAKER_01: Uh, and and they're not giving really um anybody to play alongside alongside.
22:00
SPEAKER_01: Those star players.
22:01
SPEAKER_01: Um, but Rutherford does start making some deals that end up paying off later.
22:08
SPEAKER_01: Uh the first deal he makes is actually back at the 2014 draft when he trades James Neal, James Neal to the Predators for Patrick Cornquist.
22:16
SPEAKER_01: And that was deemed risky at the time because Neil was he was a six time 20 goal scorer.
22:21
SPEAKER_01: He he was one of their best goal scorers.
22:23
SPEAKER_01: And he was still in the prime of his career.
22:25
SPEAKER_01: But Steve, you already mentioned he was kind of the he was the poster coward of that.
22:30
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, he wanted the he like he's a goal scorer, not a fighter.
22:32
SPEAKER_00: And like fighting by that time in the league was kind of like this isn't the old NHL where you could really drop your gloves and you know prove a point.
22:40
SPEAKER_00: I mean fighting kind of i if it's not completely gone now, it was definitely on its way out even back then.
22:46
SPEAKER_01: So I don't know that Neil was a guy that used fighting as like a strategy, like something.
22:50
SPEAKER_00: No, he just would get like he would just take a penalty almost.
22:53
SPEAKER_00: He would just get mad.
22:53
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
22:55
SPEAKER_01: I don't know if there was a strategy to it.
22:57
SPEAKER_01: So he he was kind of one of the poster children of that whole petulant underproducing culture, and Hornquist was the exact opposite.
23:04
SPEAKER_01: Hornquist is a guy that will stand in front of the net and and grit things out.
23:08
SPEAKER_01: So that was a risky trade, ends up being big though.
23:12
SPEAKER_01: And and and again, part of changing the culture.
23:15
SPEAKER_01: Uh he he also trades uh Brandon Suter for Nick Benino.
23:20
SPEAKER_01: Uh so the Penguins, when they won the 2009 Cup, they they modeled it on this three-center idea where you had three strong lines centered by at the time it was Crosby Malkin and Jordan Stahl.
23:33
SPEAKER_01: Well, in 2012, Jordan Stahl wants out, he wants to play with his brother in Carolina, and they had to trade him, and they trade him to Carolina where Rutherford was at the time for Brandon Souter.
23:43
SPEAKER_01: And Brandon Souter is supposed to be the guy that replaces Jordan Stahl.
23:47
SPEAKER_01: And Brandon Souter was never Jordan Stahl, he never even came close.
23:51
SPEAKER_00: He was okay.
23:52
SPEAKER_00: He was like mediocre.
23:53
SPEAKER_01: He was mediocre for sure, but they never had three they never had three.
23:57
SPEAKER_00: Stahl is more of a defensive center, and he, you know, he could put the puck in the net occasionally, but he I always thought he was more of a defensive center.
24:04
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
24:05
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
24:05
SPEAKER_01: Well, they they had, again, the idea was that you can't you can't mat you can't possibly match up all your guys with three lines.
24:13
SPEAKER_01: You could with maybe one or two lines, but three lines, you're just gonna be hosed.
24:18
SPEAKER_01: And they never had that with Souter.
24:19
SPEAKER_01: So they get Nick Benino to be their new third line center.
24:23
SPEAKER_01: Uh they also signed Matt Collin.
24:25
SPEAKER_01: Uh Collin had won a cup with Rutherford in Carolina.
24:28
SPEAKER_01: Uh he was um almost 40 years old, if not 40 years old by this time.
24:33
SPEAKER_01: So he thought he was actually going to retire uh because he didn't think anybody else would want to pick him up.
24:38
SPEAKER_01: Rutherford calls him, and he ends up being a key character guy.
24:42
SPEAKER_01: We talked about him in our B-team episode, you know, how important he was to the to the team.
24:48
SPEAKER_01: Uh and then the big deal that was made in the summer of 2015 was that Rutherford created a handful of guys and draft picks to Toronto for Phil Kessel.
24:57
SPEAKER_01: And so, Steve, how would you describe Phil Kessel?
25:01
SPEAKER_00: Uh enigmatic.
25:04
SPEAKER_00: Is that a good like puzzling?
25:06
SPEAKER_00: Like he can I I don't I maybe not.
25:09
SPEAKER_00: I mean Phil is what he is.
25:11
SPEAKER_00: You know what you're getting with Phil Kessel, probably.
25:14
SPEAKER_00: You know, he he he does he plays a certain way in like getting him to play like you know, like not turn the puck over, like right at the blue line sometimes and just you know do what he's good at, which is shoot shoot the puck.
25:33
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, he he always was a good goal scorer, but he wasn't and probably in Toronto, like maybe it was just too much and he he wasn't he's not a good he doesn't have the personality to be like a like the the face of the franchise and that's probably what they wanted in Toronto.
25:52
SPEAKER_00: So he's probably like another great like in here he wasn't the face of the franchise, all he had to be was you know Cindy Crosby or Malkin's wing, you know.
26:04
SPEAKER_00: So I mean it was probably a much better fit and roll for him here than it was in Toronto, and the pressure was good definitely gonna be not on him.
26:13
SPEAKER_00: So and he he had a tenden he was another one that had a tendency to pout a little, but I guess as we'll discuss later, like he kind of gets whipped into shape.
26:22
SPEAKER_01: So he does.
26:23
SPEAKER_01: And and you're right, Toronto was a tough market.
26:26
SPEAKER_01: I mean, that's that's the that's the the that's the the center of the hockey world in Canada.
26:33
SPEAKER_00: It's probably equivalent to like playing in New York or LA, I would say.
26:36
SPEAKER_00: Yes, that's a good comparison.
26:38
SPEAKER_01: And he he got into fights with the Porters.
26:40
SPEAKER_01: I mean, it was ugly.
26:41
SPEAKER_01: They they it he had just fallen out of favor, and Toronto was looking to trade him and kind of start over.
26:46
SPEAKER_01: And and the penguins took a chance there, and uh and ends up working out.
26:51
SPEAKER_01: And and Phil, yeah, Phil, I mean, misunderstood.
26:54
SPEAKER_01: A lot of his teammates I um when I went back and watched some of the interviews, they kept using the word misunderstood.
27:01
SPEAKER_01: Um he just wasn't he was he would kind of come across as sorely and standoffish, but maybe he just didn't like talking to the media.
27:09
SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's it's hard with guys like that.
27:12
SPEAKER_01: So um so Phil Kessel's on board as well.
27:15
SPEAKER_01: And so when the 2015-16 regular season begins, uh there's some new faces, but sort of the same mediocre level of play.
27:24
SPEAKER_01: Um the the stars are still inconsistent.
27:27
SPEAKER_01: So Mike Johnson hasn't really changed anything there.
27:31
SPEAKER_01: Um Sidney Crosby, especially, is not scoring goals.
27:35
SPEAKER_01: Um by mid-November, he has zero even strength goals, and he's a minus seven.
27:42
SPEAKER_01: And and I went back and dug up a Facebook post that I put out there around this time, and I openly talked about like, hey, I love Sid, but is it time to trade him?
27:52
SPEAKER_01: Because this it's just not working out.
27:55
SPEAKER_01: He's not gonna be the same player anymore.
27:56
SPEAKER_01: Maybe he needs a fresh start somewhere else.
27:59
SPEAKER_01: Um, it's embarrassing to look back at now.
28:02
SPEAKER_01: But at the time, it just felt like maybe it's time to break up the band.
28:06
SPEAKER_01: Like, this isn't working anymore.
28:08
SPEAKER_01: I mean, the idea with bringing in a new coach and GM was to rebuild around that core of Crosby, Malkin, Flurry, Latang.
28:16
SPEAKER_01: But maybe the problem was with the core itself.
28:19
SPEAKER_01: Um, who knows?
28:20
SPEAKER_01: But that's that's what I was thinking.
28:22
SPEAKER_01: And again, Crosby was having a miserable season and he just wasn't producing at all.
28:27
SPEAKER_01: Um on December 8th, things get worse.
28:30
SPEAKER_01: Uh Pascal Dupuy, who had been in and out of the lineup with um these lingering health problems related to a blood clot, he's told by doctors that basically his health is at serious risk if he continues to play hockey.
28:45
SPEAKER_01: And he's forced to retire very abruptly, uh, mid-December of the season.
28:51
SPEAKER_01: So that was that was a big blow.
28:53
SPEAKER_01: Um Pascal Pascal Dupuis had a really productive career here in Pittsburgh.
28:57
SPEAKER_01: Remember, he was the throw-in guy on the HOSA trade.
29:00
SPEAKER_01: It was like Jose and Dupuy for you know all the stuff we gave the thrashers.
29:05
SPEAKER_01: And he ends up being, you know, especially for Crosby on Crosby's wing, he ends up being such a key player for years.
29:12
SPEAKER_01: So, and he was beloved by not only the fans but by his teammates.
29:15
SPEAKER_01: So that was devastating.
29:17
SPEAKER_01: Uh I I went back and found an interview with Crosby the day that Dupuy announced his retirement.
29:23
SPEAKER_01: And Crosby's always so vanilla and composed in interviews, and he was he was almost in tears.
29:29
SPEAKER_01: So that was really tough.
29:31
SPEAKER_01: And and then December 12th, uh the team, on December 12th, the team's 15, 10, and 3.
29:36
SPEAKER_01: Again, inconsistent, up and down, no real prospects for the future.
29:42
SPEAKER_01: And so the organization decides we've had enough of Mike Johnston, and they replace him with the head coach in Wilkesbury, the AHL team, uh, Mike Sullivan.
29:54
SPEAKER_01: So now they've got a new head coach in the middle of the season.
29:59
SPEAKER_01: And and Mike Sullivan, I there's two things I want to talk about with Mike Sullivan.
30:04
SPEAKER_01: Number one, he he was and still is, he's a he's a really good schemer.
30:10
SPEAKER_01: Um the the Penguins have been playing this 1-3-1 counterattack under Johnston.
30:15
SPEAKER_01: Crosby, again, we always meant we mentioned his productivity was almost nothing.
30:20
SPEAKER_01: And Malkin basically just ignored it.
30:22
SPEAKER_01: I mean, he just was like, I'm gonna do what I want to do.
30:25
SPEAKER_01: So that wasn't working.
30:26
SPEAKER_01: Um, Sullivan decided to focus the team around speed, and that was that was really pioneering because Steve, you mentioned the LA Kings before.
30:38
SPEAKER_01: This is the era where the Los Angeles Kings had won two Stanley Cups, and their style of play was we're going to suffocate the opponents with defense and raw strength.
30:48
SPEAKER_01: And that was the trend.
30:49
SPEAKER_01: Teams were trying to copy that trend.
30:51
SPEAKER_01: And Sullivan decides to go totally against that grain and focus on speed.
30:56
SPEAKER_01: We're just going to be faster than you.
30:59
SPEAKER_01: And and he really wanted to establish an identity.
31:01
SPEAKER_01: He he he felt like the penguins had no identity and he was right.
31:06
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, they really didn't.
31:07
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
31:08
SPEAKER_01: And and it was interesting.
31:09
SPEAKER_01: I don't know that I ever heard another head coach say this, but what Sullivan said was you know, there's 29 other teams in the league.
31:15
SPEAKER_01: And and I want every team, when they play the penguins, they should be game planning the same way.
31:21
SPEAKER_01: So if the penguins are playing the Rangers on a Monday, uh, then they should be saying, okay, here's who the Penguins are, here's how we here's how we can beat them.
31:30
SPEAKER_01: And then if they're playing the Devils on a Wednesday, the Devil should be coming up with a similar game plan, knowing this is who the Penguins are, this is how we beat them.
31:37
SPEAKER_01: And I thought that was interesting because uh again, I never I don't know that I ever heard a coach in a sports say that, but he said we should have an identity.
31:46
SPEAKER_01: Every team should know who we are and how they're gonna game plan against us.
31:50
SPEAKER_01: So that was I thought that was interesting.
31:53
SPEAKER_01: Uh Matt Cullen, who, as we mentioned, had been around the block a few times, called Sullivan the best the best X's and O's coach he'd ever been around.
32:01
SPEAKER_01: So that was high praise.
32:02
SPEAKER_01: Uh Scottie Bowman even weighed in and said uh that he thought Sullivan had a high hockey IQ.
32:08
SPEAKER_01: So, in terms of this being a guy that that knew his X's and O's, Sullivan was really good.
32:15
SPEAKER_01: Uh, but then he was also a good leader.
32:17
SPEAKER_01: He he was he was um had a very commanding voice and presence, uh almost almost drill sergeant-esque without the you know, without the drill sergeant kind of yell, but he had that he has that thick New England accent, and he's very like take charge.
32:34
SPEAKER_01: And his his mantra was just play.
32:36
SPEAKER_01: That was his mantra.
32:37
SPEAKER_01: He he thought the penguins, you know, needed to be more resilient, which everybody, everybody agreed with that, and just play, just play.
32:45
SPEAKER_01: You can't control things that are out of your control, so just play, keep playing.
32:50
SPEAKER_01: And I I think one of the things that really exemplified that there was an incident with Malkin that first year where uh Malkin is chirping at the referees, and the the cameras catch all this happening on the TV broadcast.
33:01
SPEAKER_01: Malkin's chirping the referees, and Sullivan um gets right in front of him and and right in Malkin's face and says, Hey, shut the bleep up.
33:11
SPEAKER_01: And Malkin does.
33:13
SPEAKER_01: And you would have never seen Bausman do that, right?
33:17
SPEAKER_01: I mean No, no.
33:19
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean that definitely um showed a different type of person that he was.
33:25
SPEAKER_00: Like, I think that's probably what the stars needed at their that point in a career is somebody like, you know, kind of to tell them what's up.
33:34
SPEAKER_00: And then I mean, it when it kind of gets reinforced when they start having success and you know, people start to buy in.
33:40
SPEAKER_01: So it's funny how that changes too, because when we did our 2009 Penguins episode, we talked about how Tarrion was that disciplinarian and the team was so exhausted by that and they needed like somebody to loosen it up a little bit and let them have fun.
33:54
SPEAKER_00: Now they needed somebody to go the other way.
33:57
SPEAKER_01: And I think and I think Sullivan probably did a better job than that than Tarrian.
34:01
SPEAKER_01: Terrion just kind of treated you like you were like he was the teacher and you were the kindergartner, I think.
34:07
SPEAKER_01: And and I think Sullivan had more respect than that, but he was still tough.
34:11
SPEAKER_01: So yeah, I agree with you, Steve.
34:13
SPEAKER_01: I think that's exactly what the team needed at that point.
34:15
SPEAKER_01: And like you said, the results.
34:17
SPEAKER_01: The team starts to flourish.
34:18
SPEAKER_01: Uh Malkin and Latang both make the All-Star game.
34:21
SPEAKER_01: And Crosby, who was having that miserable season, from December 12th, which is the day Sullivan gets hired, through the end of the season, Crosby outscores the rest of the NHL, and he's named a finalist for the heart trophy.
34:34
SPEAKER_01: So that's pretty pretty amazing turnaround for a guy that was minus seven at one point.
34:39
SPEAKER_01: Uh Fleury also has a really great second half of the season.
34:42
SPEAKER_01: He posts an impressive 35 wins in 58 games played.
34:46
SPEAKER_01: So that's a lot of winning for Marc-Andre Fleury.
34:49
SPEAKER_01: Uh, and and Solomon also gets a lot out of his Wilkesbury players.
34:53
SPEAKER_01: He he ends up calling up several of his Wilkesbury players during the year, and they all um make positive um contributions, especially, I think, two guys, Brian Rust and Connor Sherry, especially stuck out.
35:05
SPEAKER_01: Um Scottie Wilson was in there too, and and um uh some other guys, but definitely those two guys made big contributions.
35:13
SPEAKER_01: So uh so the Penguins are starting to win a lot of games.
35:18
SPEAKER_01: And and meanwhile, Rutherford is still wheeling and dealing.
35:22
SPEAKER_01: Uh so there's a couple of deals he makes during the year.
35:25
SPEAKER_01: December 14th, he trades Rob Scuderi to Chicago for Trevor Daly.
35:29
SPEAKER_01: Um, Rob Skideri, uh, we talked about him in both that 2009 episode and our B team episode.
35:35
SPEAKER_01: Skideri was a really important cog in that 2009 team, and he was a really good player for the Penguins for a lot of years.
35:42
SPEAKER_01: At this point, he's on his second stint with the Penguins, and he's a little over the hill, and he's slow.
35:48
SPEAKER_01: I mean, that's the big thing.
35:49
SPEAKER_01: Rob Scuderi was not fast, and he doesn't fit in with this new style that the Penguins want to play with speed.
35:56
SPEAKER_01: Trevor Daly had kind of fallen out of favor in Chicago.
35:59
SPEAKER_01: Uh, and so they trade Skideri for Trevor Daly.
36:02
SPEAKER_01: That ends up being a massive, massive steal because Daly becomes a really important player in this run.
36:09
SPEAKER_01: And then on February 27th, another steal.
36:12
SPEAKER_01: They sent a third-round pick to the Oilers for Justin Schultz.
36:15
SPEAKER_01: And Schultz and Daly both end up becoming top four defensemen.
36:19
SPEAKER_01: And to get them for an over-the-hill Skideri in a third-round pick, that was pretty amazing.
36:25
SPEAKER_01: Uh, January 16th, they they finally give up on David Perron.
36:30
SPEAKER_01: They sent him and Adam Clandenning to the Ducks for Carl Haglin.
36:36
SPEAKER_01: And and that at the time uh doesn't seem like the greatest trade because you you had to give up a first-round pick for Perron.
36:44
SPEAKER_01: So you're in you're really turning around a first-round pick for Carl Haglin.
36:48
SPEAKER_01: And Carl Haglin was is a good player, but no one would ever trade a first-round pick for Carl Haglin.
36:54
SPEAKER_00: Well, Carl Haglin's fast, but he doesn't have like the greatest hands.
36:58
SPEAKER_00: But that but that was that was it.
36:59
SPEAKER_01: You you get you hit the nail on the head there.
37:01
SPEAKER_01: He was fast.
37:02
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
37:03
SPEAKER_01: And so and so sometimes so Carl Haglin's not worth a first-round pick if you put him on 29 other teams.
37:10
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
37:10
SPEAKER_01: But with the style the Penguins wanted to play, that's the guy that they wanted.
37:14
SPEAKER_01: And he ends up, of course, pairing on that third line with Benino and Kessel.
37:19
SPEAKER_01: And that sort of becomes a phenomenon.
37:22
SPEAKER_01: That's the HBK line.
37:23
SPEAKER_01: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
37:24
SPEAKER_00: Well, you remember they didn't even want to do it, the HBK line.
37:27
SPEAKER_00: It just kind of happened by accident because Malkin got hurt at the end of the season.
37:31
SPEAKER_00: They they weren't even going to put those guys together.
37:33
SPEAKER_00: And it was like it was kind of like out of desperation they finally Sullivan finally did it.
37:38
SPEAKER_00: And boy, once it once it clicked, it clicked for whatever reason.
37:42
SPEAKER_01: Aaron Powell Yeah.
37:43
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
37:43
SPEAKER_01: It became like a cultural phenomenon, I want to say.
37:46
SPEAKER_01: Like it really was.
37:47
SPEAKER_01: I mean, everybody, the HPK line was was just a big thing.
37:52
SPEAKER_00: They had a sandwich of Permani's the HPK sandwich.
37:55
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
37:55
SPEAKER_00: I think it was ham, bacon, and kibossi.
38:00
SPEAKER_00: It was all pork, I'm pretty sure.
38:02
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think I I don't know who gets credit for naming them the HPK line.
38:06
SPEAKER_01: I think it might have been Mark Madden.
38:08
SPEAKER_01: Uh and I think that was a reference.
38:10
SPEAKER_01: That was a wrestling reference.
38:11
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, the Heartbreak Kid or Yeah, it was uh Shawn Michaels wrestling reference.
38:16
SPEAKER_01: But but regardless, yeah, that became a big deal.
38:18
SPEAKER_01: They were they were invited to like Stephen Colbert show and stuff like that.
38:21
SPEAKER_01: It was a big deal.
38:23
SPEAKER_01: And it wasn't just because of no reason, they were they really gelt together.
38:27
SPEAKER_01: And so now the penguins have that third line that they've been trying to re-put together for so many years, and and now they have it.
38:35
SPEAKER_01: Um the reason I mentioned when I when I listed those trades, the reason I mentioned the dates is because all three of those trades were well before the trade deadline.
38:44
SPEAKER_01: So, like, and that was something that um Rutherford has been known for his entire time here in Pittsburgh.
38:50
SPEAKER_01: He makes these deals during the season before the trade deadline, and and very important deals, and he's not waiting till that last day and trying to get rental players and trying to throw, you know, compete with all these other teams.
39:03
SPEAKER_01: He's kind of identifying uh these deals before that.
39:07
SPEAKER_01: So I think that was important.
39:10
SPEAKER_01: Uh the Penguins end up winning 14 of their final 16 games.
39:14
SPEAKER_01: They end up finishing with 104 points.
39:16
SPEAKER_01: That's good for second place in the Metropolitan Division.
39:19
SPEAKER_01: And uh so they hit into the playoffs with a lot of steam.
39:22
SPEAKER_01: I mean, this season, which appeared to be you know mediocre and uh the franchise is in chaos, and maybe this is this is it for this this whole uh Rutherford experiment.
39:34
SPEAKER_01: Now all of a sudden they're roaring into the playoffs as one of the hottest teams in the league.
39:38
SPEAKER_01: And in the first round, they're playing the New York Rangers, who uh had eliminated them each of the previous two seasons.
39:44
SPEAKER_01: So that was a big deal to play the Rangers in the first round because now you have a chance to kind of exercise the demons, right, in the first round.
39:52
SPEAKER_01: Uh and um heading into that series, so so Flurry, we mentioned he had a really good second half of the season, but he had suffered a concussion near the end of the regular season, and when he was hurt, they brought up this 21-year-old kid named Matt Murray, uh very scrawny 21-year-old kid, and he plays really well.
40:10
SPEAKER_01: He goes 9-2-1 in the regular season.
40:14
SPEAKER_01: And so now you're heading into the playoffs.
40:15
SPEAKER_01: Fleury's still hurt, and Matt Murray's gonna be your goaltender in the playoffs, which I mean he was hot, but he never played in the playoffs before.
40:23
SPEAKER_01: He's 21 years old.
40:24
SPEAKER_01: Like, how good is he gonna do?
40:25
SPEAKER_01: You know, that was a concern.
40:27
SPEAKER_01: And then to make matters worse, in the final regular season game.
40:31
SPEAKER_00: I remember he got hurt, yeah.
40:33
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, they ran into it.
40:34
SPEAKER_00: Somebody ran into it.
40:35
SPEAKER_01: It was Braidenstein.
40:36
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
40:36
SPEAKER_01: Because you know, wasn't it?
40:38
SPEAKER_00: Was it the Flyers?
40:39
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
40:39
SPEAKER_00: He hit him right in the head.
40:41
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, because well, when you're when you're scumbags, you're gonna do scumbag thing.
40:45
SPEAKER_01: Um and so Braidenstein, yeah, Breadenstein ran into them.
40:48
SPEAKER_01: So now Murray's hurt for the playoffs, and they have to start their third goaltender, Jeff Zatkoff, starts the playoffs, and he actually does a pretty good job holding down the fork.
40:58
SPEAKER_01: He wins game one, they lose game two.
41:01
SPEAKER_00: I think game one was unbelievable that they won that because especially with your third goalie, like you could tell they're just kind of hanging on like for him.
41:09
SPEAKER_00: And like game two, he kind of like you could tell, okay, this guy, you know, is a third goalie for a reason.
41:14
SPEAKER_00: But like if you and that was in New York, wasn't it?
41:17
SPEAKER_00: I or was it?
41:19
SPEAKER_01: It was in Pittsburgh.
41:20
SPEAKER_00: Oh, it was here, okay.
41:21
SPEAKER_00: Well, it's still not good losing a game at home, but still I think with all the injuries, and it goes back to the just play with Sullivan, like under Balsma they would have probably or Johnson folded up the tent.
41:32
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
41:32
SPEAKER_00: It would have been swept in four, you know.
41:35
SPEAKER_00: Whereas now it's like, you know, they at least split the split the first two.
41:41
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's a good that that's a very good point.
41:43
SPEAKER_01: Because that that wasn't that was just one of many points of adversity they would face, and they overcame that.
41:50
SPEAKER_01: And Murray comes back, and after that, the Penguins just kind of overwhelmed the Rangers.
41:55
SPEAKER_01: Uh they win the next three.
41:57
SPEAKER_01: It's a short series.
41:59
SPEAKER_01: And uh I think they're one of the games at Madison Square Gardner even had to pull Henrik Lundquist out of the net because they were just peppering him with goals.
42:07
SPEAKER_01: So that that was that was great.
42:09
SPEAKER_01: That was a great way to open the playoffs, kind of uh steamrolling over the Rangers, getting that revenge.
42:15
SPEAKER_00: I call him an ice sitter.
42:18
SPEAKER_00: If you just shut the shoot the puck high on that guy, it's like, come on.
42:22
SPEAKER_01: And the Rangers were really good during that era, too.
42:24
SPEAKER_01: I mean, they had a couple of really good years there.
42:26
SPEAKER_01: They were in the Stanley Cup finals.
42:27
SPEAKER_00: That was with St.
42:28
SPEAKER_00: Louis, uh, yeah.
42:30
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, they had some good teams, but the Penguins definitely were better that year.
42:34
SPEAKER_01: Uh so that's the first round.
42:36
SPEAKER_01: But the second round is where is where you know now now we're wearing our big boy pants because the second round is against Washington.
42:45
SPEAKER_01: And the Capitals had won the President's Trophy that year.
42:48
SPEAKER_01: And and they were just by far the best team in the league all year.
42:51
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I don't think anyone at the end of the regular season would have argued that.
42:55
SPEAKER_01: They were just the best team in the league all year.
42:58
SPEAKER_01: And they they kind of had a similar road to get there that the penguins had, because you know, Crosby and Ovechkin had both come into the league at the same time, and the Capitals, like the Penguins, had built this team around Ovechkin, and that team just never won anything.
43:14
SPEAKER_01: And and they kind of dismantled that and they had kind of had to rebuild around Ovechkin the same way the Penguins are trying to rebuild around uh Crosby and Malkin.
43:23
SPEAKER_01: And they did a pretty good job.
43:24
SPEAKER_01: They they that offseason they signed TJ Oshi uh from the Blues.
43:28
SPEAKER_01: TJ Oshi was uh just a consummate winner.
43:31
SPEAKER_01: I've always been an Oshi fan ever since the Olympics, uh, where he scored all the shootout goals.
43:36
SPEAKER_00: Falso just kept sending them out there, yeah.
43:38
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I so I I've always been a big TJ Oshi fan.
43:41
SPEAKER_01: Uh and Justin Williams had won several Stanley Cups.
43:44
SPEAKER_01: He's Mr.
43:44
SPEAKER_01: Game Seven, he's the guy that always won Game Sevens.
43:48
SPEAKER_01: Uh they had they had a young emerging star, If Genekiznet's off, who obviously is a huge star now.
43:54
SPEAKER_01: Uh so they really they really had rebuilt very well around Aveckin, who was obviously still very good himself.
44:00
SPEAKER_01: So they were a really good team.
44:02
SPEAKER_01: There was, of course, a very long history between these two clubs.
44:05
SPEAKER_01: They had played each other a ton in the 90s and 2000s.
44:09
SPEAKER_01: Plus, that Crosby-Ovechkin rivalry was to hockey, kind of kind of like Larry Bird Magic Johnson was to the NBA back in the day.
44:18
SPEAKER_01: So, you know, this is going to be a tough haul playing this team.
44:22
SPEAKER_01: And game one goes in overtime, and Oshi scores in overtime to win game one.
44:28
SPEAKER_01: So the Capitals go up right away, 1-0.
44:31
SPEAKER_01: Game two, Brooks Orpick, Brooks Orpick, of course, played for the Penguins for years.
44:36
SPEAKER_01: He's one of the Penguins' all-time leaders in games played.
44:40
SPEAKER_01: But at this point, he's playing for the Capitals.
44:42
SPEAKER_01: And in game two, he hits Olimata late.
44:47
SPEAKER_01: Brooks Orpick was not a guy that played dirty.
44:50
SPEAKER_01: Brooks Orpick got a lot of big hits in his time in Pittsburgh.
44:54
SPEAKER_01: He was not a guy that ever really played dirty, but that was a dirty hit.
44:57
SPEAKER_01: And he ends up getting suspended for three games in the middle of that series, which ends up being That's unheard of in the NHL too, yeah.
45:05
SPEAKER_01: It is unheard of because they they never blow the whistle in the playoffs, they never discipline anybody.
45:10
SPEAKER_01: And and that hit was bad enough where they actually suspended Brooks for three games.
45:15
SPEAKER_01: But the Penguins, again, this is another situation where they might have collapsed in the past or or tried to get retribution on the ice by cross-checking somebody or whatever.
45:26
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna hit TJ Oshi to avenge Olimata.
45:30
SPEAKER_00: Right, yeah.
45:31
SPEAKER_00: Right.
45:31
SPEAKER_01: That's that's what they might have done in the past.
45:33
SPEAKER_01: But again, um to your point about just play, they they get their retribution on the scoreboard.
45:39
SPEAKER_01: They win two to one.
45:40
SPEAKER_01: The loss of Orpik ends up really hurting the Capitals.
45:43
SPEAKER_01: He was a very important defenseman for them.
45:46
SPEAKER_01: The Penguins win game three.
45:48
SPEAKER_01: Uh game four, Letang is suspended.
45:51
SPEAKER_01: Uh he got a one-game suspension for a hit in game three.
45:54
SPEAKER_01: I thought that was a little bit, it wasn't, it was a suspendable hit, but I thought it was a little bit of like, well, we suspended their defenseman, so we have to suspend yours.
46:04
SPEAKER_01: Uh so Letang's out for game four, but Trevor Daly does a really good job covering for the absence of Letang.
46:11
SPEAKER_01: And Hornquist wins game four in overtime.
46:13
SPEAKER_01: So now all of a sudden the Penguins are up three games to one.
46:17
SPEAKER_01: Uh and game five is in Washington.
46:20
SPEAKER_01: The Capitals do win game five to stave off elimination.
46:24
SPEAKER_01: And the series comes back to Pittsburgh for game six.
46:26
SPEAKER_01: And this is where, if you're the Penguins, you obviously want to win it in Pittsburgh in Game Six.
46:31
SPEAKER_01: You don't want to go have to go back to Washington for game seven.
46:34
SPEAKER_01: This is the this is the this is your chance to win it.
46:37
SPEAKER_01: And they roar out to a three to nothing lead.
46:40
SPEAKER_01: Uh the HBK line was really big in this game.
46:43
SPEAKER_01: Uh the all three of those goals were by Haglin and Kessel.
46:46
SPEAKER_01: Uh and the Capitals do get a couple of goals to make it three to two.
46:50
SPEAKER_01: And now we're in the third period, and the Penguins are just trying to hold on to that three-two lead.
46:55
SPEAKER_01: Like, let's just hold on to the three-two lead and wrap up this series.
46:59
SPEAKER_01: And then something really, really bizarre happens in that third period.
47:04
SPEAKER_01: And and so when they came back from the lockout in 2005, they had a bunch of new roles.
47:09
SPEAKER_01: And Steve, you you talked about some of those in our previous episodes about how they got rid of the red line, they were trying to increase scoring, um, the the automatic icing, the the trapezoid around the goaltender, all that stuff.
47:22
SPEAKER_01: One of the other roles that they implemented was that if you were in your own end and you shot the puck into the crowd.
47:29
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, you couldn't, yeah, that was a penalty.
47:31
SPEAKER_01: That was an automatic penalty, whether you did it on purpose or not.
47:34
SPEAKER_00: I remember one time Matt Cook shot it, tried to shoot at the other goal or clear it, and he shot it all the way over, like into the net, and it was a penalty.
47:41
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
47:42
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and I don't think that was like the length of the ice.
47:46
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and and Matt Cook wasn't trying to shoot it into the into the crowd there, but some guys did.
47:50
SPEAKER_00: Well then in the old days, yeah, if you were in trouble trapped in your own end, just put it in the put it in the stands.
47:56
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
47:56
SPEAKER_00: And you could make it not only you couldn't make a change, like not only was you get a penalty, you couldn't make a change.
48:02
SPEAKER_00: I think they changed that rule too, where you couldn't change, like make a line change.
48:06
SPEAKER_00: So it was like really getting punished twice.
48:09
SPEAKER_00: So not only are your players tired, you're now down a man too.
48:13
SPEAKER_01: The the the and guys did do that on purpose.
48:16
SPEAKER_01: I I remember the the one incident I remember the most was uh Darius Casparitus in game seven against Buffalo in 2001.
48:24
SPEAKER_01: They they were they were Buffalo was pressing, and Casparitus actually whacked it into the stands with his hand.
48:30
SPEAKER_01: Like he actually whacked the pike into the stands with his arm.
48:32
SPEAKER_01: And the Buffalo fans were so angry and they wanted something to be done, but that wasn't a penalty back then.
48:38
SPEAKER_01: So so I under totally understand the role.
48:40
SPEAKER_01: It was kind of like remember football they used to have like the I accidentally grabbed the face mask, it was only a five-yard penalty.
48:46
SPEAKER_01: But then they were like, you know what, it doesn't matter what your intent is.
48:48
SPEAKER_01: And so sometimes a face mask, or sometimes in football, you're pulling the guy's face mask to tackle him.
48:53
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes it's just like you brush it.
48:55
SPEAKER_00: But they went to 15 yards.
48:56
SPEAKER_01: But it just it didn't matter intent, right?
48:58
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
48:59
SPEAKER_01: So that's the role in hockey.
49:00
SPEAKER_01: And the Penguins get three delay of game penalties inside the span of two minutes.
49:06
SPEAKER_01: So they shoot the puck-up into the crowd, it's a penalty.
49:08
SPEAKER_01: They're trying to kill that penalty, they shoot the puck into the crowd again, and then it happens a third time.
49:14
SPEAKER_01: It you'll never ever see that again, I don't think.
49:18
SPEAKER_01: I really don't.
49:19
SPEAKER_01: It was so bizarre and so unusual.
49:22
SPEAKER_01: And the Capitals have a five-on-three power play, which is pretty much an automatic goal, and they score and they tie the game and they send it in overtime.
49:30
SPEAKER_01: And and this is another scenario where I feel like the old penguins would have just like packed up their bags and went home.
49:37
SPEAKER_01: Because, man, you're on the cusp of winning the series, and that was just bad luck.
49:43
SPEAKER_01: Those guys were not shooting the puck into the crowd on purpose.
49:45
SPEAKER_01: You would never do that, especially once you were down a man and down until you were down two men.
49:49
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
49:49
SPEAKER_01: There's no way you're going to do that on purpose.
49:51
SPEAKER_01: But the puck just kind of floated up into the crowd three times.
49:55
SPEAKER_01: And so bad luck.
49:57
SPEAKER_01: But you know what?
49:58
SPEAKER_01: They went into the locker room.
49:59
SPEAKER_01: Sid actually gives a speech about, hey guys, forget what happened.
50:03
SPEAKER_01: Let's just score the next goal, let's end this.
50:06
SPEAKER_01: They go into overtime, they're pressing a lot in overtime, and Benino gets a rebound, puts it in the net, and they eliminate the Almighty Capitals in six games.
50:15
SPEAKER_01: And it was so satisfying just to beat that team, and to beat the team, because that was the that was the Capitals year.
50:22
SPEAKER_01: They were going to win the cup that year.
50:24
SPEAKER_01: And to beat them in the second round was so satisfying.
50:26
SPEAKER_01: And I always remember Mike Lang's call at the end of that game, after Benito scores, he says all the president's men couldn't put Humpty together again, referencing the president's trophy that they won.
50:38
SPEAKER_01: Um, that of course meant nothing at that point because now they were eliminated.
50:42
SPEAKER_01: So that was that was great and so satisfying to beat the Capitals on the way to a cup, just like they had in 2009.
50:50
SPEAKER_01: Um but it wasn't over.
50:52
SPEAKER_01: The Eastern Conference Finals are against the Tampa Bay Lightning, who uh were the defending conference champions.
51:00
SPEAKER_01: They had been in the finals the year before.
51:02
SPEAKER_01: They had swept the season series against the Penguins, too.
51:04
SPEAKER_01: So the Penguins had not beaten them all season.
51:07
SPEAKER_01: So they weren't the president uh trophy winners, but they were no slouch.
51:11
SPEAKER_01: Yeah uh the other problem with playing the Lightning was um so they were overwhelming everybody with their speed.
51:19
SPEAKER_01: That didn't overwhelm Tampa because they played a similar game.
51:22
SPEAKER_01: They were also very fast.
51:24
SPEAKER_01: Uh and they were also very resilient.
51:26
SPEAKER_01: Uh they Stephen Stamcos was their best player.
51:29
SPEAKER_01: He was hurt, and they had overcome that.
51:32
SPEAKER_01: And then in game one of the series against the Penguins, uh Ben Bishop, who was their starting goaltender, he also gets hurt.
51:38
SPEAKER_01: And they too have to turn to a 21-year-old kid, Andre Vasilevsky, uh, who, like Matt Murray, just starts playing lights out once they put him in, and he he eventually becomes their longtime goaltender.
51:51
SPEAKER_01: So uh Tampa Bay is is very similar to the Penguins, and they come out, they storm to a three-to-one victory in game one at Pittsburgh.
52:00
SPEAKER_01: And game two is kind of back and forth, and that goes into overtime.
52:04
SPEAKER_01: And and at this point, that's a that's a big overtime because if the Tampa Bay gets the goal there, then they just won the first two games in Pittsburgh.
52:13
SPEAKER_01: Uh fortunately, Crosby gets the game winner there uh so that the Penguins uh go back to Florida with it being tied one to one.
52:20
SPEAKER_01: That that was interesting.
52:22
SPEAKER_01: Fun fact up until that point, neither Mario Lemieux nor Sidney Crosby had ever scored a playoff overtime goal in their careers.
52:30
SPEAKER_00: And that's kind of funny how that works because Yeah, normally it's like the secondary players it seemed, or like somebody you don't expect.
52:36
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
52:36
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
52:37
SPEAKER_01: I mean, yeah, players that have scored overtime goals for the Penguins in the playoffs, Luke Robottai, uh Darius Caspar, Brooks Orpick scored an overtime goal.
52:46
SPEAKER_00: That's right.
52:47
SPEAKER_00: I think that's the one the only time they beat the island.
52:49
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
52:49
SPEAKER_01: That was just that was actually a series winning goal that Orpick scored.
52:53
SPEAKER_01: So it's just funny how that works out.
52:54
SPEAKER_01: But Crosby scored there.
52:56
SPEAKER_01: Um the the Penguins go down to Florida, they win game three, but they lose game four.
53:02
SPEAKER_01: Uh the other thing that happened in game four was that they lost Trevor Daly.
53:06
SPEAKER_01: Uh he broke his ankle, and so now he's off for the rest of the playoffs, which is we talked about how important Daly was and how that was a big loss for them, yeah.
53:13
SPEAKER_01: That was a real big loss.
53:15
SPEAKER_01: Um were they gonna be able to overcome that?
53:17
SPEAKER_01: Um it's also clear at this point after four games of the series that Matt Murray's starting to struggle.
53:22
SPEAKER_01: Maybe he's starting to come back to Earth a little bit.
53:25
SPEAKER_01: And and Fleury, Fleur had been ready to come back for a while.
53:28
SPEAKER_01: They just weren't gonna put him in because Murray was on fire.
53:31
SPEAKER_01: And so now they're heading into game five, and it's tied to two, and and they decide, okay, thanks Matt Murray, thanks for everything.
53:40
SPEAKER_01: But it's time to go back to our franchise Stanley Cup winning goaltender now that we're in crunch time.
53:46
SPEAKER_01: Uh so Flurry starts game five and he he plays he plays okay, but not certainly not great.
53:52
SPEAKER_01: And the Penguins lose game five at home in overtime.
53:56
SPEAKER_01: So now they're facing elimination for the first time.
53:59
SPEAKER_01: Uh heading back to Tampa for game six.
54:03
SPEAKER_01: And Sullivan makes a really, really guessy decision.
54:07
SPEAKER_01: He goes decides to go back to Matt Murray for that elimination game six on the road.
54:12
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I I don't know, Steve.
54:14
SPEAKER_00: I thought that was it definitely was uh I don't know, I mean, unorthodox.
54:19
SPEAKER_00: Like, you know, most coaches probably will win the veteran, but um I guess you know, it just shows like Sullivan isn't really married to one player or the other, you know, who who go whatever he thinks can win.
54:30
SPEAKER_00: So Yeah, it definitely, as we're gonna see, works out well for them.
54:35
SPEAKER_01: It it does.
54:36
SPEAKER_01: It does, but man, it was I wasn't.
54:38
SPEAKER_00: One thing two teams hadn't figured out like Matt Murray's weaknesses, like I think in the next series, San Jose starts to figure it out, if I remember correctly.
54:45
SPEAKER_00: Like he kind of has a weak glove hand.
54:47
SPEAKER_00: Like he's very good at like like he kind of like a line like reminds me of like Linquist, like he's good at because he's tall, he's good at like taking up the net, and like you know, if he can get down to like kind of his butterfly, like he stops a lot of stuff, but his goal, his glove hand is a little weak.
55:02
SPEAKER_00: So Yeah.
55:04
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
55:05
SPEAKER_01: So g game six, uh the lightning get the first goal.
55:09
SPEAKER_01: Uh and that that's big because they're playing at home, they've just won the last two games, they have all the momentum, and now they get the first goal, the crowd's going crazy.
55:18
SPEAKER_01: But the Penguins video coach, Andy Saucier, he's he sees that Tampa was off sides and he relays down to the bench to Sollivan to tell him to challenge it.
55:27
SPEAKER_01: He's like, I think they were off sides, challenge it.
55:29
SPEAKER_01: So Sullivan challenges it, and the goal gets reversed.
55:33
SPEAKER_01: And it's it's a seemingly like small moment, but it it's important.
55:37
SPEAKER_01: It shifts the momentum.
55:39
SPEAKER_01: And it's one of those like what if moments.
55:41
SPEAKER_01: Like, what if that goal counts?
55:43
SPEAKER_01: Would that have changed the outcome?
55:44
SPEAKER_01: Maybe, maybe not.
55:45
SPEAKER_00: Well, first goal in hockey is always kind of big.
55:48
SPEAKER_01: Well, especially again, they were playing at home and they just won two games.
55:51
SPEAKER_01: Like they were just they were just that rock kept rolling downhill for them.
55:56
SPEAKER_01: And then it was like all of a sudden it was like, whoa.
55:59
SPEAKER_01: So um, so that was important.
56:01
SPEAKER_01: The penguins come back, they win game six, send the series back to Pittsburgh for game seven.
56:06
SPEAKER_01: Uh, game seven in Pittsburgh, unlikely star is Brian Ross.
56:10
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
56:11
SPEAKER_01: Mr.
56:11
SPEAKER_01: Game 7.
56:12
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, he has two goals, the only two goals for the Penguins in that game.
56:16
SPEAKER_01: And the Penguins cling to a two-to-one lead for the entire third period.
56:20
SPEAKER_01: Steve, the thing I remember about that third period was just it was one of those like prevent defense kind of situations where you're just hanging on for dear life the whole time.
56:32
SPEAKER_01: It was so nerve-wracking, you know, with the the conference on the line and just come on, please hold the lead, please hold the lead.
56:38
SPEAKER_01: And I I remember uh I remember Doc Emmerich at one point was like, he said something like, This is just great hockey, and I'm just like, no, it's not.
56:48
SPEAKER_01: It is not great hockey.
56:50
SPEAKER_01: Just score, make it 3-1 or 4-1 so I can just relax.
56:53
SPEAKER_00: Well, I always thought two-goal lead was the worst goal, like because you tend to relax, so with a one goal, maybe you don't ever remember.
56:59
SPEAKER_00: Maybe, but you know that any any mistake, it could be the luckiest bounce ever, yeah.
57:05
SPEAKER_01: Right.
57:05
SPEAKER_01: Uh they do hang on.
57:07
SPEAKER_01: It's a little shaky at the end.
57:08
SPEAKER_01: I forget, was it Benino?
57:10
SPEAKER_01: Somebody had a chance to just like shoot the puck like into like the middle of the ice and just the clock would have ticked away, but he like shot it up the boards and went into the um bench, and they had to do a face-off in the zone.
57:23
SPEAKER_01: So it was a little shaky at the end, but they help they hang on, they win the game, they win the series.
57:28
SPEAKER_01: Uh, and just like in 2009, uh Sid comes out and and with the alternate captains, with Malkin and with Chris Kunitz, and they hoist the Prince of Wales trophy up in the air.
57:39
SPEAKER_01: So, so uh, if you listen to our 2009 episode, in 2000, there was a long-standing tradition, you don't touch the Prince of Wales trophy because that's not the trophy you want to win.
57:49
SPEAKER_01: And so nobody would touch it.
57:50
SPEAKER_01: And in 2008, Sid didn't touch it, but in 2008 they lost to the Red Wing.
57:55
SPEAKER_01: So in 2009, he touched it, and then in 2016, of course, he's gonna do the same thing.
58:00
SPEAKER_01: He's gonna touch it again.
58:01
SPEAKER_01: So they listed the Prince of Wales trophy up in the air on home ice, and they're in the Stanley Cup finals, and the team that they play in the finals is the San Jose Sharks.
58:12
SPEAKER_01: Uh San Jose was um had a long history of kind of unfulfilled expectations.
58:18
SPEAKER_01: They had a lot of strong regular seasons, a lot of talent.
58:23
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, like the San Diego Chargers of hockey, yeah.
58:26
SPEAKER_01: That's a great comparison.
58:27
SPEAKER_01: It really is, because you're right, they had a lot of really good players.
58:31
SPEAKER_01: They had they had Patrick Marlowe and Joe Thornton for years, and they just never really, they never really went that far in the playoffs.
58:38
SPEAKER_01: Um, but this was their year.
58:40
SPEAKER_01: They overcame all that.
58:42
SPEAKER_01: They made it all the way to the finals, they won the Western Conference.
58:46
SPEAKER_01: And so, you know, was this going to be their year, right?
58:49
SPEAKER_01: Um, and it ends up being a competitive series.
58:52
SPEAKER_01: It doesn't go the distance like the Tampa Bay series did, but it's it's a bunch of really close games.
58:57
SPEAKER_01: Um game one is it is in Pittsburgh.
58:59
SPEAKER_01: That's tied with two minutes left when Benino scores to win the game in the final two minutes.
59:06
SPEAKER_01: Uh game two goes into overtime.
59:08
SPEAKER_01: Uh game two is pretty pretty impressive because it goes into overtime and they have a face-off in the shark zone.
59:14
SPEAKER_01: And Crosby huddles everybody together, and he tells Shiri to, and Letang, he basically says, I'm gonna win the face-off, I'm gonna win it back to Letang, and you're gonna and Letang, you're gonna pass it to Sherry, who's gonna kind of move to the middle of the ice, which was not his normal position.
59:32
SPEAKER_01: And and then he told Sherry he wanted him to shoot it from there.
59:35
SPEAKER_01: And that's exactly what happens.
59:37
SPEAKER_01: Like Crosby wins the face-off back to Letang, over to Sherry, Sherry beats Martin Jones and wins the game in overtime.
59:45
SPEAKER_01: Um you know, so that was just that was this classic, like best player in the world, just dictating what was going to happen.
59:51
SPEAKER_01: Um, so that was that was a big win.
59:54
SPEAKER_01: Um the sharks did accuse Sid of cheating on that face-off, but whatever.
59:59
SPEAKER_01: I mean, sure.
1:00:02
SPEAKER_00: Um it wasn't like it was the guy from the Kings who had to make a rule where you couldn't do it with your he was just like grabbing people and like they take his hand and bat it back or yeah.
1:00:12
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I mean it it was it was Logan Kachure who who made that accusation, and he he said that Sid like somehow timed it, somehow like knew how to time it.
1:00:22
SPEAKER_01: It didn't make a lot of sense, but whatever.
1:00:24
SPEAKER_01: Be a sore loser, fine.
1:00:25
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
1:00:26
SPEAKER_01: Uh uh the series goes back to San Jose for game three.
1:00:29
SPEAKER_01: Uh the sharks win game three in overtime, but the penguins take game four.
1:00:33
SPEAKER_01: Uh Murray was really good in that fourth game.
1:00:36
SPEAKER_01: Um, by this point, he's come back.
1:00:38
SPEAKER_01: Um Fleurry at this point, you know, people were people are starting to wonder, okay, what happens to Fleury now?
1:00:44
SPEAKER_01: Because Murray, you know, Murray was definitely the the guy.
1:00:48
SPEAKER_01: And do you keep Murray?
1:00:49
SPEAKER_01: Do you go back to Fleury?
1:00:50
SPEAKER_01: But that was a conversation for way after the season.
1:00:52
SPEAKER_01: Right now, Murray's definitely the guy.
1:00:55
SPEAKER_01: Uh and that sets up a dramatic scenario for game five, because the series comes back to Pittsburgh, and now the Penguins have a chance for the first time ever to win the Stanley Cup in Pittsburgh and to to um win a championship on Pittsburgh soil for the first time since Mass hit the home run in 1960.
1:01:14
SPEAKER_01: And I know, Steve, this is one of your favorite Pittsburgh moments.
1:01:17
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it was just everybody went nuts.
1:01:19
SPEAKER_00: It was just it was probably like a little too much.
1:01:22
SPEAKER_00: Like the tea, like sometimes your teams do like they get too pumped up, like win one for the home team in the city, and maybe they got a little bit too too uh excited, but they were definitely ready to go.
1:01:34
SPEAKER_00: It wasn't like they weren't ready to go, the sharks just responded well and ended up.
1:01:38
SPEAKER_00: I mean, what were the four goals in the first period?
1:01:41
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it was a lot of scoring early, and then the sharks just kind of pulled away.
1:01:45
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it it was disappointing for sure, because you man, it would have been so cool to win that on home ice.
1:01:50
SPEAKER_01: And I think that was like a Thursday, and I it it was a weekday.
1:01:54
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it would have gone all weekend for sure.
1:01:56
SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah.
1:01:57
SPEAKER_01: I mean the city was just on fire.
1:01:59
SPEAKER_00: I think there were 20,000 people, I'll say there were there were as many people outside as there was in the arena.
1:02:04
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and that had started sometime in the afternoon.
1:02:07
SPEAKER_01: I mean, that that was it was I was downtown that day, and just um the whole day was just penguin mania.
1:02:14
SPEAKER_01: It was like a it was just like a a celebration.
1:02:17
SPEAKER_01: Maz was actually is actually at the game.
1:02:20
SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, it's it's it just but it didn't go as planned.
1:02:24
SPEAKER_01: Uh but the penguins still have two more chances to to win this thing.
1:02:28
SPEAKER_01: So so they go back to San Jose for game six.
1:02:31
SPEAKER_01: Um and and Martin Jones, the goaltender for the Sharks, uh, he deserves a lot of credit.
1:02:37
SPEAKER_00: He played a good series.
1:02:38
SPEAKER_01: He played a he played a really good series.
1:02:40
SPEAKER_01: And that game six, uh, the first period of that game, he made some huge saves because I could have gotten away from San Jose really quick.
1:02:47
SPEAKER_01: Uh, it's tied one to one in the second period.
1:02:50
SPEAKER_01: Uh Latang uh takes a shot from like the far uh side of the net and it goes in.
1:02:56
SPEAKER_01: And so now the penguins are up two to one.
1:02:59
SPEAKER_01: And once again, kind of like that Tampa Bay series, they have a 2-1 lead ending into the third period, and they have to hold it for the third period, but this time it's not as nail-biting.
1:03:10
SPEAKER_01: Um, the penguins really clamped down in the third period, and amazingly, the sharks only get two shots on net that entire third period, which is which is hard to believe.
1:03:18
SPEAKER_01: So they whatever prevent defense or whatever that they might have been playing in that other game seven, that other scenario that we mentioned earlier, they do something different here, and the sharks only get two shots on net.
1:03:29
SPEAKER_00: I don't think the sharks were like as offensively they weren't set up the way Tampa Bay were.
1:03:35
SPEAKER_00: They were more like the kings, like big and strong and beach.
1:03:38
SPEAKER_00: Like I remember like Mike Milberry describing it as trying to like swat flies with like, you know, the shotgun.
1:03:46
SPEAKER_00: You know, it was just there's a bunch of little guys skating around, you couldn't get to them.
1:03:51
SPEAKER_00: So and that was an you know, another fun thing when when they did win, is like uh who's the the NBC?
1:03:59
SPEAKER_00: It it was Mike Milberry and Keith Jones.
1:04:02
SPEAKER_00: They picked against the penguins every series.
1:04:05
SPEAKER_00: They were wrong four times in a row.
1:04:09
SPEAKER_00: Every time.
1:04:10
SPEAKER_00: You were wrong four times in a row, hockey geniuses.
1:04:15
SPEAKER_00: Which uh was just especially with Bill Milberry, you know, because he's such a he doesn't like the penguins at all.
1:04:21
SPEAKER_00: But I mean, that was that was kind of a nice little side effect of all that.
1:04:26
SPEAKER_00: Aaron Ross Powell Yeah.
1:04:26
SPEAKER_01: Millberry, of course, had the history with the penguins losing to them in the early 90s when he was Boston's coach.
1:04:32
SPEAKER_00: So he threw sticks on the ice and stuff.
1:04:34
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:04:35
SPEAKER_00: Badger Bob is like the nicest guy ever, called him the professor, like Dr.
1:04:38
SPEAKER_00: Charles don't like Badger Bob.
1:04:41
SPEAKER_00: Melberry's a jerk.
1:04:44
SPEAKER_01: That's definitely the case.
1:04:46
SPEAKER_00: Trevor Burrus, Jr.: But it wasn't just him, it was Keith Jones.
1:04:48
SPEAKER_00: There was a lot of people, like every time the Penguins are going, oh, they're gonna lose, they're gonna lose to New York, oh, they're gonna lose to Washington.
1:04:53
SPEAKER_00: And I could see picking against them against Washington, but like like Tampa Bay and like the Rangers, really?
1:05:01
SPEAKER_01: I mean, well that that speaks to again, I I think that speaks to everybody had seen so many years of them just okay, they had a bunch of good players, but then they just they just couldn't handle the pressure or the ups and downs of a playoff series.
1:05:17
SPEAKER_01: Because they had people had watched the penguins fold too many times in the past.
1:05:21
SPEAKER_01: And so maybe that played into it, but this was definitely a different Penguins team.
1:05:25
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I think they had proven that up until this point, and now they're they're um in the final minutes against the Sharks.
1:05:33
SPEAKER_01: The they pull Jones out of the net, Hornquist gets the puck, and shoots on the empty net, it goes in, and Panamonium erupts on the Penguins' bench.
1:05:41
SPEAKER_01: Panemonium definitely erupted where I was watching the game.
1:05:44
SPEAKER_01: Uh and the Penguins win the Stanley Cup.
1:05:47
SPEAKER_01: And it's it's amazing to think where they were at the beginning of that season, even December of that season.
1:05:53
SPEAKER_01: You know, it was just this middling franchise.
1:05:56
SPEAKER_01: They had no direction, they had no identity, they seemed like they were badly.
1:06:00
SPEAKER_01: Mismanaged.
1:06:01
SPEAKER_01: They didn't have any kind of plan.
1:06:02
SPEAKER_01: They had a GM that said he was going to quit.
1:06:04
SPEAKER_01: They had a coach that was that inspired nobody.
1:06:07
SPEAKER_01: They had star players who seemed like they were done.
1:06:10
SPEAKER_01: To go from that to being the champions, it's an amazing, amazing turnaround, and it's such a memorable season.
1:06:19
SPEAKER_01: They bring the Stanley Cup out, and there's some cool moments in there.
1:06:22
SPEAKER_01: I think the first guy that Crosby handed the cup to was Trevor Daly, who of course had broken his ankle.
1:06:29
SPEAKER_01: And then they they um gave it to Pascal Dupuy, too.
1:06:32
SPEAKER_01: That was a that was a big moment.
1:06:34
SPEAKER_01: He got to hoist the cup and be part of that team.
1:06:36
SPEAKER_01: Um he was around the team all year, even though he had retired, had had to had to retire in the middle of the season.
1:06:42
SPEAKER_01: Uh so that was cool.
1:06:43
SPEAKER_01: And then of course it was cool to see Mario hoist the cup because he had been through so much.
1:06:48
SPEAKER_01: This was his fourth cup.
1:06:50
SPEAKER_01: And you know, for all the questioning of the hires and the changes that were made, um he ended up being smarter than the rest of us.
1:06:59
SPEAKER_01: And he did, you know, because he he knew what they were doing.
1:07:01
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
1:07:02
SPEAKER_00: Well I wonder if Sullivan provided the direction, and once Rutherford could see the direction he was going in, he kind of like was able to jump on board and find the players for Sullivan.
1:07:12
SPEAKER_00: That you know, it does take some teamwork, but like maybe Johnston just didn't have the right direction that that team needed.
1:07:20
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, that's a good that's a good point.
1:07:22
SPEAKER_00: And once once yeah, there was a direction and more of a clear plan that was working, you know, Rutherford found play, like you know, he found Haglin and some other players that fit in more with the system, you know, they wanted to play.
1:07:34
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, that's that's a that's a possibility.
1:07:37
SPEAKER_01: I mean, and and but of course it was Rutherford that hired Sullivan to begin with or promoted him.
1:07:42
SPEAKER_01: So yeah, it it it's I think they definitely worked well as a team for sure.
1:07:47
SPEAKER_01: Um so yeah, the penguins win the cup, they have a parade, it's it's a big celebration, and it's another championship in Pittsburgh.
1:07:57
SPEAKER_01: Uh you know, the aftermath of all this, uh the penguins come back and repeat the following season.
1:08:03
SPEAKER_01: Um the the big storyline through that season, we'll we'll probably cover that in a separate episode, but uh again the big storyline was what what do you do at goaltender?
1:08:11
SPEAKER_01: Yeah you know, and they end up making the controversial.
1:08:13
SPEAKER_00: And no one had repeated since ninety-eight, ninety-nine or ninety nine, since the Red Wings.
1:08:19
SPEAKER_01: Since the Red Wings in ninety yeah, it was ninety-seven, ninety-eight.
1:08:21
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:08:22
SPEAKER_01: And that was the pre-CAP era, so nobody had repeated in the cap era because it was a lot harder to do.
1:08:27
SPEAKER_01: You couldn't keep all your players together.
1:08:29
SPEAKER_01: And and the penguins made the controversial decision that next season to keep both goaltenders.
1:08:34
SPEAKER_01: Uh they they Matt Murray was basically designated the starter, and everybody thought, oh, they'll trade Fleury at the trade deadline.
1:08:41
SPEAKER_01: No, they end up keeping them.
1:08:42
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, they end up keeping them, and that ends up being very key.
1:08:44
SPEAKER_00: And it it cemented all their the Rock Crosby Malkin and Flurry even too, like because Flurry did win a lot of games during the regular season.
1:08:52
SPEAKER_01: So it it's it's um it's pretty amazing.
1:08:58
SPEAKER_01: They repeat.
1:08:59
SPEAKER_01: Uh uh Rutherford ends up staying beyond two years.
1:09:03
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
1:09:04
SPEAKER_00: I guess when you win a cup, yeah, it gives you a couple more years.
1:09:06
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:09:06
SPEAKER_00: So Rob Rossi is still working at Dairy Coin.
1:09:11
SPEAKER_00: Uh he hoist the blizzard every year.
1:09:16
SPEAKER_01: Uh and and and uh and Sullivan uh at the time of this recording, if at least is still the head coach and and you know still doing a pretty good job.
1:09:26
SPEAKER_01: Uh I think the biggest thing for this cup was it really cemented Crosby's legacy and Malkin's legacy in Pittsburgh.
1:09:34
SPEAKER_01: Because before that, it was that they had won that one Stanley Cup when Crosby was 21 years old, and then the rest of his career was going to be, you know, let downs and disappointments and you know uh yelling at refs and and and batting the the glove away from the Flyers player, you know, that kind of stuff.
1:09:53
SPEAKER_01: That was that was kind of where his legacy was trending.
1:09:56
SPEAKER_01: And and then, you know, now we're at the point where he's won three cups and you know he's still what uh 32.
1:10:04
SPEAKER_01: So he's Yeah, same thing with Malkin too.
1:10:06
SPEAKER_00: It's a shame Malkin Malkin doesn't seem to get a lot of respect.
1:10:08
SPEAKER_00: Like he was left off one of those lists they make.
1:10:12
SPEAKER_00: Like did the NHL have like a hundred-year anniversary and they they left him off the list, which doesn't make any sense because I mean he has to be one of like he definitely is I he's just a different player from Ovechkin because he's a center, not a wing.
1:10:28
SPEAKER_00: And Ovechkin's definitely a pure goal scorer.
1:10:30
SPEAKER_00: But I mean, if you want to win a win a championship, be you know, you need Malkin on your team.
1:10:36
SPEAKER_00: I mean if the Russians want to have any chance of winning an Olympic gold medal, they better put Russia, you know, put Malkin there.
1:10:42
SPEAKER_00: I mean, yeah.
1:10:43
SPEAKER_00: And how in God's name they haven't won a gold medal with all that talent, I still can't figure out.
1:10:50
SPEAKER_00: But I mean Yeah, no, and they haven't even meddled, I don't think.
1:10:55
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I mean uh i that's true.
1:10:58
SPEAKER_01: But but regardless of what the national media or whatever thinks about Mulgan, I again I think his legacy is cemented here.
1:11:06
SPEAKER_01: Uh you know, that's that to get that second cup and then to get a third one, of course, a year later.
1:11:11
SPEAKER_01: Um it just they if they don't win again for the rest of their careers, I think that's a pretty strong legacy.
1:11:18
SPEAKER_01: Three steel three championships.
1:11:20
SPEAKER_01: Um how many other Pittsburgh athletes outside of the Super Steelers in the 70s have that on their resume?
1:11:26
SPEAKER_00: I guess it would be the only one, yeah, because Ben only has two.
1:11:29
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
1:11:29
SPEAKER_01: Troy only has two.
1:11:30
SPEAKER_01: Willie Starwagel and those guys only had two.
1:11:33
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I mean, so so yeah.
1:11:35
SPEAKER_01: Mario, Mario Lemieux.
1:11:36
SPEAKER_01: He has two, yeah.
1:11:37
SPEAKER_01: Only had two as a player.
1:11:39
SPEAKER_01: So again, really cemented their legacy, really turned things around.
1:11:43
SPEAKER_01: Uh just a special special season, one that I think uh will be remembered for a long time and one that's fun to go back and relive.
1:11:51
SPEAKER_00: HBK.
1:11:52
SPEAKER_01: HBK.
1:11:54
SPEAKER_01: My my my favorites, one one quick last story.
1:11:57
SPEAKER_01: They they were um they were supposed to go on one of those late night talk shows.
1:12:01
SPEAKER_01: I can't remember which one.
1:12:03
SPEAKER_01: Uh but they um Haglin relayed the story that that they sent a plane, so they all met at the airport, and it was the plane was going to take him to New York to be on this national talk show.
1:12:15
SPEAKER_01: Stephen Colbert or or Jimmy Fallon, or I can't remember which one.
1:12:19
SPEAKER_01: And they they they're on the tarmac, and Haglin and Benino are waiting there, and Kessel comes up and he sees the plane, it's like very small.
1:12:27
SPEAKER_01: And Kessel goes, I'm not getting on that thing.
1:12:28
SPEAKER_01: And Kessel just leaves and goes home.
1:12:30
SPEAKER_01: And and Haglin says he just left and went home and went to sleep, and we never saw him again.
1:12:36
SPEAKER_01: And then they didn't do the show.
1:12:38
SPEAKER_01: So that was just kind of like the Phil.
1:12:39
SPEAKER_01: That's Phil Kessel is not here anymore.
1:12:42
SPEAKER_01: And he kind of he kind of had an expiration date on his time in Pittsburgh.
1:12:47
SPEAKER_00: But he's still a good hockey player, and he he's apparently not a bad teammate.
1:12:50
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I don't think.
1:12:51
SPEAKER_00: He's just bad with the media.
1:12:53
SPEAKER_00: I mean, yeah, he's good.
1:12:54
SPEAKER_00: He's not really that bad of a teammate, it doesn't seem he never quits on the team or yeah.
1:12:59
SPEAKER_01: I don't think he's he's nowhere near the class of a lot of people.
1:13:01
SPEAKER_00: And he's tough to catch.
1:13:02
SPEAKER_00: And that was another big thing about having Rick Talkett is and I think it played out more in the next season, like where Phil had a few more meltdowns, but like, you know, Mark Matt calls Drick the the jerk whisperer.
1:13:13
SPEAKER_00: And he really is like he really, for whatever reason, like I don't know, it's just because Talkett's like a tough guy.
1:13:18
SPEAKER_00: He could really somehow keep Kessel in line and check for those couple years until you know I guess Rick Talkett eventually.
1:13:25
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, he left.
1:13:26
SPEAKER_00: He did, yeah.
1:13:27
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and they I guess Kessel had Kessel went with him eventually to Arizona.
1:13:30
SPEAKER_01: So yeah, I mean K Kessel was really good and he was a little bit one-dimensional, and he, you know, he kind of had his moments of, you know, melting down, but he was nowhere near like an Antonio Brown.
1:13:42
SPEAKER_01: He wasn't that kind of guy.
1:13:43
SPEAKER_00: He's kind of a discount like Ovechkin.
1:13:45
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:13:46
SPEAKER_00: Like like maybe not quite the goal scorer Ovechkin is, but Ovechkin at least checks people and stuff, though.
1:13:51
SPEAKER_00: I mean, he doesn't even do that.
1:13:53
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, Kessel's Kessel's very, very one-dimensional.
1:13:56
SPEAKER_01: I I I was not opposed to when they when they finally said so long.
1:14:00
SPEAKER_01: And I think Phil Kessel, nobody holds any O welcome.
1:14:03
SPEAKER_00: No, he got we got two at least Stanley Cups out of them.
1:14:05
SPEAKER_00: And I never felt like he quit on the team or yeah, anything.
1:14:08
SPEAKER_01: No, he'll be welcomed back here for the rest of his life.
1:14:10
SPEAKER_01: Like they will drive him out twenty years from now.
1:14:12
SPEAKER_00: He can eat hot dogs out of the Stanley Cup anytime he wants.
1:14:15
SPEAKER_00: And the best part is he went back to Toronto and did that.
1:14:18
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
1:14:19
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that was great.
1:14:20
SPEAKER_01: And and even, you know, that there was that whole thing, Phil Kessel is a Stanley Cup champion.
1:14:24
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
1:14:25
SPEAKER_01: And he I think even Barack Obama, when they went to the White House, that's what that's what he said.
1:14:29
SPEAKER_01: That's the first thing he said.
1:14:30
SPEAKER_01: Uh so that was kind of that was kind of funny.
1:14:33
SPEAKER_01: Um so yeah, Kessel, Kessel, all those guys, just a memorable team, memorable season.
1:14:39
SPEAKER_01: Any last thoughts?
1:14:41
SPEAKER_00: No, no, just a great season and uh fun fun to reminisce about that.
1:14:45
SPEAKER_00: And uh Mike Sullivan definitely, I think, was the key piece that made it all come together.
1:14:51
SPEAKER_00: That was some you know defensive trades and the Benino acquiring Benino, which is an apps was an absolute steal for those three years.
1:14:58
SPEAKER_00: Shame they couldn't keep him beyond there, but like you said, that's what happened with the stand the salary cap is like uh you just can't afford guys eventually.
1:15:06
SPEAKER_02: Right.
1:15:06
SPEAKER_02: Right.
1:15:07
SPEAKER_00: He played him, he the way he played, he paid himself into a nice little payday.
1:15:11
SPEAKER_00: Good for Nick Benino, I guess.
1:15:12
SPEAKER_00: He did.
1:15:13
SPEAKER_00: He did, yeah.
1:15:14
SPEAKER_01: And and uh Yeah, that whole line's gone now.
1:15:17
SPEAKER_01: Haglins gone and and Castle Ann Benino.
1:15:20
SPEAKER_01: But man, they really made a difference in the time that they were here.
1:15:24
SPEAKER_01: Thanks everybody for listening.
1:15:26
SPEAKER_01: Uh please check us out wherever you get your podcast.
1:15:29
SPEAKER_01: Please go to our website, it's Pittsburgh Sports Memories.weavely.com.
1:15:33
SPEAKER_01: We're also on Twitter, we're also on Facebook.
1:15:37
SPEAKER_01: And uh if you like what you hear, please leave us a review.
1:15:40
SPEAKER_01: Uh that would be super nice.
1:15:43
SPEAKER_01: So thanks everybody for listening, and we'll catch you next time.
1:15:46
SPEAKER_00: Thanks for everybody listening in France.
1:15:49
SPEAKER_01: Fun your word for our board.