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REWIND: The Penguins Turn to the Dark Side · Pittsburgh Sports Memories

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Hi everybody.
• 0:01
  SPEAKER_00: This week's rewind is this episode we did on some recent penguins history.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_00: And I think the the penguins of the Crosby Mulkin with Anger have had a really interesting trajectory.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_00: You know, they they came in, kind of took the lead by storm when that Stanley Cup.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_00: But then they had some real lows and they really bottomed out and then rebuilt and when there's those two additional Stanley Cups.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_00: This episode really looks back at that low point that they they hit in the middle of that stretch.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_00: And uh and really talked about, you know, how it it helped kind of build them for the future.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: So I hope you enjoyed this episode we did on the 2012 Pittsburgh Penguins.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: Hi everybody, welcome to the Pittsburgh Sports Memories Podcast.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Tim Hannon.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm Steve Wirt.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_00: And each uh episode in this podcast, we take a look back at some memorable moment in Pittsburgh sports history.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_00: This time we're going to look back at a 2012 playoff series between the Pittsburgh Penguins and the Philadelphia Flyers.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: So the Penguins and the Flyers uh have a very rich rivalry in history.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: We've talked about that a little bit in previous podcasts, uh, and we won't go into the whole the whole history of that rivalry.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_00: But uh it's certainly been renewed uh around this time when Sidney Crosby joined the Penguins.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: His very first game against the Flyers, Darien Hatcher took out a couple of his teeth, uh, and then Sid scored in overtime to beat them.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_00: And uh from that moment onward, that that rivalry just sort of hit another level.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_00: Everybody in Philadelphia hated Crosby, Crosby hated them, and uh and that's where that was.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: So the Penguins um what won the cup in 2009.
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_00: We we did a podcast about that previously.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: Go check that out if you haven't already.
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_00: And they come back in 2010 uh and they lose a tough seven-game series to Montreal, uh, largely due to um the fact that Yurisov Halak, the goaltender for Montreal, was just on fire.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_00: And that that ended their two-year streak of um winning the conference.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_00: They'd won the conference in 2008 and 2009.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: Uh in 2010, it was just, you know, it was just you can't win the conference every year, right?
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: So they come back the next year, 2011, that's the year the new arena opens, and that year starts off with a bang.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, Sidney Crosby goes on a 25-game point streak in which he records 26 goals.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_00: Crosby was scoring goals that year the way that um people like Lemie and Gretzky had in the 1980s.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_00: He was just on fire.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: He was playing at another level.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_00: That had really started the year before when he scored the golden goal in the Olympics for Canada, uh, beating the United States.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_00: That kind of elevated him to another level.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_00: And at this point in 2011, he is just the undisputed best player in the world.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_00: Um Chris Letang, who had been uh uh a pretty good defenseman up until that point, sort of broke out and became a superstar.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_00: Um and the Penguins are just having this amazing season until New Year's Day, when the Penguins host the Capitals at Hines Field for the winter classic.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and in that game, David Steckel for the Capitals throws his shoulder into Crosby's head and concusses him.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um Crosby misses a few games, comes back, gets hit in the head again by this time it was Victor Headman, and then that's it for his season.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_00: He's done for the whole season all of a sudden because of concussions.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and then if Genny Malkin tears his ACL, he's out for the season.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: So uh that that 2011 season quickly goes south.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_00: The Penguins still qualify for the playoffs, but they're knocked out in the first round by Tampa Bay, uh not having their two best players.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_00: So so now we're we're two years removed from winning the cup.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_00: Uh they're heading into the the 2011-2012 season, and and Crosby South is still sort of up in the air.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but that offseason, the really what was really interesting about that offseason was that Yaramir Yager, who had spent the previous three seasons playing in Russia, announces I I'm ready to come back to the NHL.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_00: And Yager, of course, is one of the Penguins' all-time greatest players.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but things did not end well for him in Pittsburgh.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_00: He was traded away after the 2001 season, and there was a lot of bad blood between him and the fans.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: And every time he had come back as a member of the Capitals or the Rangers, he got booed every time he touched the puck.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_00: But time heals all wounds, as they say, and Jagger was still he was in his thirties, but he was still a good goal scorer.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_00: And the offensive system that that Dan Bosma had implemented, everybody kind of thought, hmm, maybe maybe Jagger would be a good fit here, and I I could forgive him, we could welcome him back.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_00: And it wasn't just the fans.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_00: Uh um, you know, there there was what really fueled the speculation was an interview that Yager did when he was still in Russia, and this was his quote.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_00: He said, if Mario Lemie would call me and say, I'd like you to play for our team, I would think about it a lot.
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_00: I would play for the minimum salary just for him because I owe him my hockey life.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_00: I want to pay him back because Mario made me what I am.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_00: That's Yagger.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_00: That's Yager.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_02: That's what he said.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_02: And I can understand, like, before this, like before we lead into what he did, like I could I think I can understand, like, I never could understand, let me say this, why people booed him.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_02: Like, what did he do to deserve getting booed besides he got traded.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_02: He didn't ask to be traded.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_02: They traded him because they couldn't afford him at the time, and Ted Leonis down in Washington or Yeah, it's where he went, Washington, decided he wanted to spend a bunch of money and not win a Stanley Cup for like ten more years.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_00: I I think it was his like his just constant the drama.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I I I hate to compare it to Antonio Brown because it's not even in the same ballpark.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_00: But but it was people were tired of the drama with him, you know.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_00: He was dying alive and quotes like that.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_00: You know, he was f he was fighting with coaches, and I think people just were were tired of Yager and his sort of like up and down uh I'm I'm this guy one day, I'm this guy another day.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_00: And I think I think this whole incident really reminded everybody why we didn't like Yawger.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_02: Well, it definitely didn't help his reputation.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_02: Well, well, and and so again Because like I remember going to like you said, I remember going to a Rangers game like uh Crosby's rookie year, and like everybody like booing him, and then and I was like, why?
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_00: Like okay, yeah, it it was probably a little over the top.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_00: Um however, uh like by this point, I think that had worn off.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_00: Like he was in Russia for three years, he wasn't even in the league.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_00: And I think people the only like the people that were would have still booed him at that point, there were very few of those people left.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_00: And people were ready to welcome him back, and the penguins actually are also interested in welcoming him back, and they start negotiating with them, and supposedly Mario himself gets involved and allegedly thinks that they have a done deal.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_00: And so now everybody's briming with excitement.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_00: I remember there are all these rumors that oh Yagger's at the airport, he's actually in town already.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_00: There was a whole you know, hashtag YawgerWatch.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_00: And then the news comes out, Yager signs a one-year deal with the Flyers.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_02: Of all the teams, too, yeah.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_00: But of all the teams.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_02: If you would have gone to Vancouver, yeah.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_00: And and it was just and it it was like he's like, well, they offered me more money.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_00: It's like, but you said you'd play for the minimum salary to play for Mary.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_00: What happened to that?
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_00: And and that was just typical Yager.
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_00: It's like, don't don't worry about what I said yesterday.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_00: That doesn't really count.
• 8:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um and and so uh I I I I dug out this quote from Dejan Kovakovic, who I believe was writing for the trib at the time, and I think it sums it up perfectly.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_00: He wrote, this was the day after Yager signed with Philadelphia.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_00: He wrote, It's as if Yarma Jager woke up Friday morning after dreaming of fans welcoming him at Pittsburgh International Airport, of donning a pen sweater again, of reuniting with Mario Lemie, of being handed the Stanley Cup by Sid, of locking his number 68 raised to the rafters, and then thought, hmm, how can I really stick it to those people?
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_00: Well, he found the perfect way.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_00: And that that just that sums it up perfectly.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_00: So so now we head into the 2012 season minus Yager, and Crosby is starts the season still suffering symptoms from the concussion.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_00: You just kind of thought, like, okay, he had the whole offseason, we had an early playoff exit.
• 9:10
  SPEAKER_00: He he had been out since like February.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_00: He'll definitely be back by October when the season starts, and he's not.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_00: Uh he misses 20 games at the start of the season, finally comes back.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, Sid's finally back, plays in eight games and clearly just isn't right, and then misses another 40 games due to concussion-like symptoms.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_00: He he essentially misses two seasons of what was his prime due to these concussion symptoms.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_00: And then you start now you're starting to think, is he ever going to play again?
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_00: Um the good news was the team not only survives this, it actually thrives.
• 9:44
  SPEAKER_00: It it was very reminiscent of the 91 season where Mario had started the season with the back injury.
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_00: He had missed most of the previous season, end of the previous season, started 91 hurt, and the team kind of learned how to live without him.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_00: And then when Mario came back, they obviously went on the run to that first championship.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_00: Um and so this team uh was was doing that.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_00: And and really, once again, it was If Genny Malkin carrying the team on his back.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_00: Uh he had a 50-goal season.
• 10:14
  SPEAKER_00: He was actually named the the MVP of the league that year.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_00: Uh it was his his first and I believe his only heart trophy.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um so the Penguins are doing very well.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_00: Crosby, meanwhile, just can't seem to heal.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and eventually he goes to see a specialist in Utah on the advice of his friend Tom Brady.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, Tom Brady suggests this specialist in Utah, and the specialist discovers an abnormality with his C1 and C2 vertebrae.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not going to pretend to know about what that means, but apparently it's not just concussion symptoms, he has a significant neck injury as well.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_00: And apparently when they treat that, finally Crosby returns to the lineup in March.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_00: Um and I think that's one of the one of these like Pittsburgh sports stories that no one ever remembers is that Tom Brady, you know, kind of helped Sidney Crosby come back after all that.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_00: Nobody would ever want to remember that story.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um but that's what happened.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_00: T B-12.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_00: I mean the T V twelve diet worked out for him.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_00: The T T V twelve doctor, T V twelve whatever.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_02: Um I wonder if it was that crazy guy that Belichick kicked out of the locker room.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_02: Who knows?
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_00: It worked, though, and and he came back.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_00: And and at this point, now he's back in the lineup.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_00: The Penguins are already having a great season.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_00: Now they get the best player in the world back, and they finish the season red hot.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_00: They actually went on an 11-game winning streak, uh, which is a lot in hockey to win 11 games in a row.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: Uh a streak that actually ends in Philadelphia on a buzzy beat on a buzzer beater overtime goal by Scotty Scottie Hartnell, of all people, um, who's very much disliked here in Pittsburgh.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_00: Uh however, they still finished the season with 108 points.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_00: Uh unfortunately, that was one point behind the Rangers for the best record in the conference.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_00: And because the Rangers were in their division, uh, instead of finishing with the number one seed, they actually finished with the number four seed because of being in the same division.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_00: But they had the second best record in the conference.
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, uh as a sports fan, you you always have hope, right?
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_00: You always think your team's gonna you always hope that your team can do something.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_00: But then there's seasons where you just you know like this is a championship caliber team that I'm watching.
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_00: Think of, I don't know, Steve, the 2008 Steelers.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, there's think of examples where you just know this team could actually win the whole thing.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_00: 2004.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 12:45
  SPEAKER_00: That was another one.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, just you could think of years like that.
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_00: And there's other years where, well, we if we squeeze into playoffs and maybe we win a few games, who knows we can.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_00: But this was this was one of those years where no, this is this is truly one of the best teams.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_00: We could win this whole thing.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and so I I felt, and a lot of other fans felt like the sky was the limit.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_00: So they're in the playoffs, and their opponent in the first round ends up being the Flyers, their biggest rival.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_00: Uh these two teams, as we talked about in when we did our 2009 uh Penguins podcast, these two teams had met in both 08 and 09, with the Pens embarrassing the Flyers both times.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_00: Um and and so we spent some time talking about, you know, after the Penguins won the 2009 Cup, sort of what happened to them between that point and the point where the series was ready to begin.
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_00: So let's talk about what had been going on in Philadelphia during that same time.
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_00: So in 2010, the Flyers made what some people would call a magical run to the Stanley Cup Finals uh under new head coach Peter Laviolette.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_00: They had made the playoffs on a shootout win in the final regular season game.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_00: So they had to win the final regular season game against the Rangers, and they won it on a shootout.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_00: They actually, a shootout got them into the playoffs.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_00: Then in the second round, they were down 3-0, three games to nothing against Boston, and they came back one of the few times in sports history a team has overcome a 3-0 deficit to win a series.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_00: And then they, in the conference finals, they eliminated the Canadians who had upset both the Capitals and Penguins in the previous rounds.
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_00: So in 2010, the Flyers find themselves in the Stanley Cup Finals.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_00: It's a Cinderella story, it's a it's an amazing story, uh, but it leads to an all-time great moment, at least for me as a Penguins fan, in Game 6 of the Stanley Cup Finals.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_00: Chicago is up three to two, the games in Philadelphia goes in overtime.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_00: Philadelphia has to win to stay alive.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_00: And Patrick Kane not only scores the cup winning goal, but no one sees it go into the net except for Patrick Kane.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_00: So the Flyers are still skating around, the refs, the buzzer never goes off, and the the Blackhawks are out on the ice celebrating.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_00: All the fans in Philadelphia are looking around, like, what the heck's going on?
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_00: So not only did their hearts get ripped out, but they didn't even know what happened until about five minutes later.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_00: And so that that just felt good to see them lose in that fashion.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_00: In 2011, uh and in 2012 um they they had pretty good teams.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_00: 2011 they won their the division.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_00: 2012, again, they they were a pretty good team.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um Philly, so so the Penguins had Crosby.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_00: Uh Philly's big up-and-coming star was Claude Giroux.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and with Crosby being injured for, again, like we said, almost two years, many people are starting to put uh Giroux on a pedestal as perhaps the league's best player.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_00: And in 2012, he actually puts up a career high 93 points.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_00: So he has a really good season, and he's really coming into his own as maybe the next the next guy.
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_00: Uh the Flyers also that that season in 2012, they really shook up their roster.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_00: Uh that they we already mentioned that they signed Jagger, but they had also traded away two of their best players.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_00: They traded away Mike Richards, who was their captain, and they traded away Gef Jeff Carter, which was kind of shocking.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_00: Those were two of their core players, but in return, they got guys who had become staples in their lineup for really much of the remainder of the decade.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_00: They got Braden Shen, Wayne Simmons, uh, and Jacob Vorchak.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_00: They also signed a guy named Max Talbot, who, of course, uh was famous in Pittsburgh for scoring the two goals in game seven to win the Stanley Cup, and for shishing the uh the Philadelphia crowd in the 2009 series.
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_00: So Max Talbot was hated in Philadelphia, but uh so was Jauger because he had played for the Penguins for so many years, but they'd signed both of those guys.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um and, you know, they they had had a really good season.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_00: They they also had overcome a lot of adversity to get to the postseason, just like the Penguins.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_00: Uh they were also playing without their captain, uh, who was their captain at the time was Chris Pronger, the Hall of Famer, and he missed uh most of the season with post-concussion symptoms as well.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_00: And he actually never played again after that.
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_00: That was the end of his career.
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_00: So the Flyers, uh, you know, they they have a pretty good team that year, just like the Penguins.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but they're still the Flyers, and there's still a lot of bad blood between these two teams.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_00: Uh there was a game late in the season where they're playing at the um PPG PPT Paints Arena, and Scott Hartnell, um, there was a guy that used to dress up as Hulk Hogan, like uh there was a Penguins fan that used to dress up as Hulk Hogan, and Hartnell was mocking him.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um Tony Granado, who is an assistant coach for the Penguins, he he got into a shouting match with Latvia Love.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_00: They were standing on the benches screaming at each other.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_00: What were they even fighting about?
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_00: Uh who knows?
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_02: But go look up the clip on YouTube.
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and they're like literally just like, yeah.
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_00: Well, and that game was one of the uh the games where uh they had Pierre Maguire sitting in the middle.
• 18:01
  SPEAKER_00: It was like on NBC.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's right.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_02: Because I remember the saying, watch out, Pierre.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_00: And Pierre's like sort of sort of narrating what they're screaming about, but yeah, it was it was pretty ugly.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_00: This is still in the regular season.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so heading into the playoffs, uh Hartnell was quoted as saying that the series was gonna be a bloodbath.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_00: And uh Crosby had just come back from these concussions, so a lot of people were wary about that.
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, this was a team that that had a history of playing dirty, and oh my gosh, what are they gonna do to Sid?
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_00: Uh he just came back from all this, and are they gonna try to hit him in the head?
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_00: So a lot of people were wary about that.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_00: The other interesting thing about the series that year heading into the playoffs, those two teams had played against each other uh six times, and there was very little defense in any of those games.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_00: Uh there were there were um a bunch of goals, and there were two games where there was uh combined ten goals or more.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_00: So when when the two teams played each other that year, there were a lot of goals, and that was for sure foreshadowing what this playoff series was gonna be.
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_00: So the series starts, game one is in Pittsburgh, and right o right off the bat the Penguins just start peppering Philadelphia with goals.
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_00: Penguins are up three to nothing after the first period.
• 19:23
  SPEAKER_00: The fans are going crazy, this is gonna be an easy win.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and then not so fast.
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_00: Not so fast.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, Danny Brere uh for Philadelphia got two goals.
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_00: One of those was on a breakaway, which there will end up being many, many breakaways in this series.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_00: Not a lot of defense here.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_00: Not a lot of defense.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_00: Uh Shen ties it in the third period, and then the game goes into overtime, and Vorachek wins it in overtime.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_02: They blew a 3-0 lead.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_00: They blew a 3-0 lead in game one.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_00: So that's not a great way to start the series in Pittsburgh, too.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I remember thinking that after the first period, oh, they're they're gonna win this easy, and it was like, uh no.
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_02: Not so much.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_02: Not so much.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_00: And uh uh Ed Snyder, the late uh owner for the Flyers, um actually remarked after that game that his team was in Pittsburgh, quote, in Pittsburgh's head.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_00: And uh boy, he sort of ends up being right.
• 20:20
  SPEAKER_00: G game two, Crosby scores fifteen seconds into the game.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_00: This is again in Pittsburgh.
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_00: And then Kunit scores to make it two to nothing.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_00: So again, bam.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, we had this tough game one, but we're back.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna, we're gonna, you know, we're gonna recover and and bounce back.
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_00: Well, after after the Penguins go up two-nothing, Max Tablet gets a short-handed goal from the for the Flyers again on a breakaway.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_00: And then Sean Katorrier, who is uh uh at the time 19 years old, uh he actually ends up scoring a hat-trick for Philadelphia.
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_00: It's the youngest playoff hat-trick since 1945.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_00: And the Flyers just keep erasing deficits.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_00: Penguins are up 2-0, they come back.
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_00: Uh Penguins are up 3-1, 4-3, 5-4, and the Flyers come back and actually win the game 8-5.
• 21:10
  SPEAKER_00: So it's like every time the Penguins try to take a lead, the Flyers just score goals and come back, and then the final isn't even close.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_00: It's eight to five.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_00: And so now panic starts setting in, right?
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's this great Stanley Cup season is now looking like it's a little bit in jeopardy because we can't play defense.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_00: And then the the Penguins are starting to look rattled.
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_00: They're just starting to look rattled.
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_00: They can't hold a lead, and they're starting to to become unglued.
• 21:41
  SPEAKER_00: So um at this point, it's it's Penguins are down two nothing.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_00: We're heading back to Philadelphia.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_00: We know both goaltenders are not playing well.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_00: Um the Flyers had uh a guy named Ilya Briskalov.
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um Is that the infamous I'm only afraid of bear in the woods?
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_02: I thought.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_02: I forgot about that.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_02: No, I'm only afraid of like bear in the woods or because he doesn't speak very English very well.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_00: And they had some good teams.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_00: You know, again, being in the Stanley Cup finals in in 10, being in the conference finals in 2008, I think the thing that really hurt them was they never had a franchise goaltender.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_00: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_02: They had Ray Emery for like a minute.
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_02: Ray Emory, Brzkolov.
• 22:30
  SPEAKER_02: Brobosky before he was good.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, the one good goaltender they had was Sergei Bros Brobsky, but they gave up on him.
• 22:37
  SPEAKER_00: And they actually gave Brezkolov a nine-year contract.
• 22:40
  SPEAKER_00: And of course, uh Babrovsky went on to win the Vezna trophy twice as a member of the Blue Jackets.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_00: So the one good goaltender they had, the franchise goaltender they had.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_02: And their defense Brobsky's never been that great in the playoffs.
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_02: I mean he's a good goalie, but he seems to struggle in the playoffs.
• 22:57
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor Burrus, I think they would have taken a two-time Vesina winner over the guys they had.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_02: Maybe he was afraid of a bear in the woods.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_00: And and they chose to give Briskolov a nine-year contract.
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that was pretty pretty heavy.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that was one of those weird Yeah, the the hockey was starting to do the like they would do those really long contracts to spread out the pay so you could be under salary cap.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_02: So they were doing like kind of weird stuff like that.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_02: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_00: And if you could if you had a franchise goaltender you could lock up, then that was you know Especially in hockey like a goalie can la can play, can have a really long career.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_00: So so Briskoff isn't exactly lighting it up, but on the other side of the ice, Marc-Andre Fleury for the Penguins is also struggling mightily.
• 23:37
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and and it wasn't all his fault.
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_00: It like I said, a lot of breakaways, just terrible defense, terrible discipline.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um but but Flurry is not exactly standing on his head to stop any of this either.
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um so so they're down to nothing.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_00: In in the whole Biosme era, I I think that the biggest knock on the team, the whole Biosme era, was that they were easily rattled.
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_00: And this series was was not disproving any of that.
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_00: You know, they they they had leads, they had solid leads in both of those games.
• 24:11
  SPEAKER_00: They came apart, and anytime somebody just messed with them or did something even a little dirty, you just see would you just see guys complain and yell and push and just look like they were easily frustrated.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_00: And that was that was I think what eventually um just became the the the way that that that those teams were known what those teams were known for.
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_00: So they go back to Philly for game three.
• 24:38
  SPEAKER_00: Once again, the penguins take an early lead.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_00: Uh but Fleury misplays a puck and basically like literally just bats it into his own net.
• 24:47
  SPEAKER_00: He had it in the crease and he just misplayed it and and bats it right into the net.
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_00: And as usual in the series, the the penguins sort of allow that to dictate their emotions.
• 24:58
  SPEAKER_00: Like they can't recover from that.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_00: That that I think that only made it one to one, but they can't recover from that.
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_00: So Philly starts scoring goals, they take a three-to-one lead, and after every goal, there's pushing and shoving.
• 25:10
  SPEAKER_00: You can see the penguins are just starting to melt down again.
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_00: Crosby and Dero get into a fight, which is odd to see the two-star players fighting.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_00: Letang Especially like with a history of concussions, you'd think that would be a bad idea.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_02: It was it was being punched in the head can't be uh good for business there.
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_00: There's a lot of bad ideas in this game.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_00: Uh Latang and Kima Tiemen get into a fight.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_00: Uh Craig I Craig Adams and Scott Hartn Scott Hartnell get into a fight, and Adams, uh Hartnell had like this wild, like long hair.
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_00: And Adams pulled his hair during the fight, and he got ended up getting suspended for that.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_00: Uh James Neal, who was a guy that I just I don't know.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_00: He he was he was one of those guys that was a skilled player, but he never quite realized his potential in Pittsburgh.
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_00: He keeps shot at Katorier, he got suspended.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_00: And then really the low point, uh Aaron Atham.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_00: Aaron Atham is a guy who the Penguins had signed.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_00: He had he was a former flyer, and I never liked when we signed Flyers.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_00: I just didn't.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_00: Going all the way back to when we signed when we traded for Rick Tocket back in 92, I just didn't like when we signed former Flyers.
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_00: Um but in the case of Tocket, he was a good player.
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_00: Aaron Asham was just a a a a goon.
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_00: And the Penguins management at different points, the Penguins management have always convinced themselves we're not tough enough, we're not physical enough, and they've made decisions like this to go out and sign guys like Aaron Asham, who they think It's kind of like the early version of Matt Cook.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_00: Well they just they they sign these guys where they think like, okay, this will be the guy that that he'll be our enforcer or he'll be our tough guy.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_02: But that's kind of the um the oilers had that with Gretzky.
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_02: They had a you know, who was it, Taidomi?
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_02: Uh yeah, or because nobody would touch Gretzky because you know you knew you could.
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you you could have So maybe they were trying to follow that theory a little bit.
• 27:05
  SPEAKER_00: You could have guys like that.
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_00: It's never any time the Penguins have tried that, it's just never worked.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_02: It's never worked for them because people still pick on the Crosby's still fighting Drew with a history of concussions, which is the whole reason why you would think you would have Aaron Asham fight Drew, not yeah.
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_00: Well, and Aaron Asham was not that guy.
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_00: He was not a defender, he was just a cheap shot artist.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_00: And in this game, uh Brayden Shen had, I I I I believe it hit Paul Martin.
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_00: It was a totally clean hit.
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_00: And Asham decided he didn't like that, and he went out and he h hunted down Shen and he cross-checked him in the throat.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_00: And then as Shen crumples down to the ice uh then Asham jumped on top of him and started throwing punches as Shen's knocked out on the ground.
• 27:53
  SPEAKER_00: And honestly, and this is my opinion, but to me, it was the single most disgusting on-field act I've ever seen a Pittsburgh sports figure commit in any sport.
• 28:03
  SPEAKER_00: It was such a cheap shot, it was totally unnecessary.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_00: He just hunted him down, hit him in the throat, and then as he's gagging for air, he just starts punching him in the head while he's on the ice.
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_00: It was it was just the worst.
• 28:18
  SPEAKER_00: Um Asham was suspended four games for this, which in the playoffs is an eternity.
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_00: That was the rest of that series.
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_00: And Ashham never played another game in a penguin's uniform after that, and it wasn't soon enough.
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_00: Uh one point later in the game, Voritzek, his glove had come off, it was laying on the ice, and as he's bending down to reach for it, Crosby knocks away with a stick.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_00: I remember that.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it was like real like he tried to pretend like he wasn't doing it too.
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_02: Like he was like, Oh yeah, I'm looking over there, and he just kind of scooted.
• 28:49
  SPEAKER_02: It was totally childish.
• 28:51
  SPEAKER_00: It was it was beyond childish.
• 28:53
  SPEAKER_00: And they asked Crosby about it after the game, and Crosby is, you know, if if Crosby gets emotional on the ice, but when you interview Crosby, he is the most uh you know pla um, you know, just just toes the line.
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_00: You know, well, you know, it was a tough game.
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_02: He's normally very composed and very composed, yeah.
• 29:12
  SPEAKER_00: And after this game, they asked him about that play, and he said, because I don't like them.
• 29:18
  SPEAKER_00: They said, You don't like him?
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_00: He said, I don't like any guy on their team.
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_00: He said, What was I supposed to do?
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_00: Sit there and pick up his glove for him?
• 29:24
  SPEAKER_00: What was I supposed to do?
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_00: Wow.
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_00: And so Crosby's completely out of his game.
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_02: He's I can see like why like you know, Crosby always gets booed in other cities, and I never quite understood that.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_02: And I guess maybe that that was part of, you know, that actions like that, you know, because like you look at other sports and other like Crosby's obviously one of the bigger names in hockey, if not one of the biggest.
• 29:51
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, even outside of like Tom Brady, who might get booed every other place, like Peyton Manning doesn't get booed like that.
• 29:59
  SPEAKER_02: Everybody loves Peyton Manning or you know, who like Michael Jordan.
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_02: I remember I didn't I didn't like Michael Jordan, but I thought I thought I was like the only one in the country that didn't like Michael Jordan, you know.
• 30:10
  SPEAKER_02: Everybody, you know, even people that were fans of other basketball teams really liked Michael Jordan.
• 30:15
  SPEAKER_02: So but I guess stuff like this probably played into Crosby, like people call him Sidney Crybaby and stuff like that.
• 30:23
  SPEAKER_00: Oh he he he has he has every right to hate the Flyers, he has every right to be upset.
• 30:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um but you can't.
• 30:30
  SPEAKER_00: You just can't.
• 30:30
  SPEAKER_00: You can't sit there and you know, we're just supposed to do pick up his glove.
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_00: He's a jerk.
• 30:35
  SPEAKER_00: I hate him.
• 30:36
  SPEAKER_00: You have to be the consummate professional, you have to be the captain, you have to be the face of the league.
• 30:40
  SPEAKER_00: Well, if Aaron Asham does that, no one cares.
• 30:43
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_00: But Crosby, Crosby did.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_00: And and you talked about, you know, these these guys, uh, you know, I I I'm sure Peyton Manning got booed in uh I don't know, uh Tennessee, whatever, whatever their rival was at the time.
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_00: Or you mentioned Brady.
• 30:59
  SPEAKER_00: Like if Brady gets booed in New York playing the Jets, and they interview him after the game and he says, Oh, it's so stupid.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_00: I use the stupid thing.
• 31:06
  SPEAKER_00: Like, all you're doing is you're just throwing fuel into the fire.
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_00: And you just, as a professional, you can't do that.
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_00: And Crosby really never did usually did.
• 31:15
  SPEAKER_00: But boy, he just he had completely lost it in this series.
• 31:19
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and so the Flyers win game three, eight to four.
• 31:23
  SPEAKER_00: Um in those three games, so they have a three-nothing series lead, and in those three games, the Flyers have scored an unbelievable twenty goals in three games, which is just off the charts unbelievable.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um we mentioned the suspensions, Dan Biosma is fine$10,000.
• 31:41
  SPEAKER_00: Why was he fine$10,000?
• 31:43
  SPEAKER_00: Because his players were totally out of control, pulling guys' hair, whacking gloves, cross-checking people in the throat, punching them while they're on the ice after being cross-checked in the third.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_00: That's why.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_00: And it probably should have been a bigger fine.
• 31:55
  SPEAKER_00: I I the worst part about the uh about that game three, especially, was you know, you're playing against the Flyers.
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_00: And they're the team who cheap shots people.
• 32:06
  SPEAKER_00: They're the team who, you know, once hunted down Robbie Brown because he had the audacity to score a goal on Ron Hextahl.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_00: They're the team who once got a delay of game penalty, caught on their fans for throwing things onto the ice.
• 32:18
  SPEAKER_00: They're the team who's disgusting and embarrassing, not us.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_00: And that wasn't the case in this series.
• 32:25
  SPEAKER_00: The script completely flipped.
• 32:27
  SPEAKER_02: And so yeah, that's a pretty good coach.
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_02: I I I know we don't like him.
• 32:31
  SPEAKER_02: He's from Philadelphia.
• 32:32
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_02: And we beat him in when he was in Nashville, too, but he's a pretty solid coach.
• 32:36
  SPEAKER_00: He was a really he was a very good coach, and they were the ones who were composed.
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_00: They were the ones playing good hockey.
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_00: They were the they weren't the ones cross-kicking people in the throat.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_00: It was us.
• 32:45
  SPEAKER_00: We the script completely flipped.
• 32:47
  SPEAKER_00: And part of hating the Flyers is having some level of moral high ground.
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_00: So you didn't have the high ground here.
• 32:54
  SPEAKER_00: No.
• 32:54
  SPEAKER_00: The the Penguins completely seeded all that away.
• 32:57
  SPEAKER_00: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 32:57
  SPEAKER_00: They were the Anakin.
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 32:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, they were the Anakin Skywalker.
• 33:01
  SPEAKER_00: They had no high ground.
• 33:02
  SPEAKER_00: But I mean, but literally, it's like I just that that game, especially, that third game, where they just, you know, they had the bad play with Flurry, and then they j everybody just lost it, lost their minds completely and melted down like a bunch of eight-year-olds.
• 33:20
  SPEAKER_00: Really.
• 33:20
  SPEAKER_00: Like a bunch of eight-year-old kids playing a game where they're just mad that they're losing.
• 33:25
  SPEAKER_00: And I I just I've never been more disgusted to be a Penguins fan in my life than I was after that game.
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_00: I really haven't been.
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_00: So now we still they're still the series isn't over officially yet.
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_00: They're down 3-0.
• 33:39
  SPEAKER_00: Uh they go into game four.
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_00: They're short-handed.
• 33:43
  SPEAKER_00: Again, we mentioned three guys got suspended.
• 33:46
  SPEAKER_00: Uh but somehow or another, the Penguins bounced back and they actually annihilated Philly 10-3.
• 33:53
  SPEAKER_00: Um so that's again, lots and lots of goals again.
• 33:58
  SPEAKER_00: This time the Penguins have scored 10 goals.
• 34:00
  SPEAKER_00: Uh Jordan Stahl scored a hat-trick, and 14 of the 19 skaters for the Penguins uh recorded at least a point.
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, and it was the first time that they had scored 10 goals in a playoff game since 1989 when they also scored 10 goals against the Flyers.
• 34:17
  SPEAKER_00: Uh Brooks Orpick after the game said, quote, this is like the weirdest series I've ever seen, which was an understatement.
• 34:25
  SPEAKER_00: Um the the games one through four, the combined score, the combined goal total was 45 goals.
• 34:32
  SPEAKER_00: That was an NHL record for the opening four games of a seven-game series, which again, when you look back at the 1980s and that era of the game.
• 34:41
  SPEAKER_00: It's hard to believe, yeah.
• 34:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, because it because this was, you know, this was more the lockdown defensive era of hockey.
• 34:48
  SPEAKER_00: And you look back at like the 80s when you had no goaltender equipment and it was just all goals all the time, uh yeah, nobody scored 45 goals through four games.
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_00: So that was pretty crazy.
• 35:00
  SPEAKER_00: Uh game five uh finally sees some goaltending.
• 35:05
  SPEAKER_00: Um Flurry, who just was terrible up into that point, stopped twenty-four of twenty-six shots, uh and the Penguins won again.
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_00: So now okay, well now it's three now it's um three games to two.
• 35:22
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, you know, maybe there's some hope, maybe, uh, but then game six, Duroux scores 32 seconds into the game, and the Flyers go on to route the Penguins five to one, and that's the end of the season, the end of a once promising uh 2012 season.
• 35:41
  SPEAKER_00: So the aftermath of all this, um the Flyers get knocked out in the next round, uh, and Dareux has to have surgery on both wrists, which he blames Crosby for.
• 35:53
  SPEAKER_00: He says uh the reason he has to have surgery on his wrist is because Crosby kept whacking him on face-offs.
• 35:59
  SPEAKER_00: Uh Crosby said, if I caught his wrists, then I'm not sorry.
• 36:03
  SPEAKER_00: He said, I think it's hilarious that Philly would be the ones to complain about that, given that they're the ones that usually did that kind of stuff.
• 36:11
  SPEAKER_00: So, no love lost again.
• 36:14
  SPEAKER_00: Um Peter Laviolette, the the coach of the Flyers, calls Garoux, quote, the best player in the world.
• 36:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um and that that's kind of a uh a critical point in Giroux career.
• 36:29
  SPEAKER_00: He's made captain the following season and he never really delivers on the promise of being, quote, the best player in the world.
• 36:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um the Flyers kind of go into a little bit of a downside.
• 36:39
  SPEAKER_00: They only make the playoffs twice in the next five seasons.
• 36:42
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and Giroux's still a pretty good player, but I don't know that he was ever ever in that c conversation again for best player in the world.
• 36:51
  SPEAKER_02: So you would have said it was a was a fraud.
• 36:54
  SPEAKER_00: I Yeah, I mean, that was always his nickname.
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_02: Full disclosure, fraud jeroux.
• 37:01
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 37:01
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't know.
• 37:02
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, uh he he was certainly, you know, that that season especially, he was very good.
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't I don't know exactly what happened with him.
• 37:11
  SPEAKER_00: Um but he he certainly never never again delivered on that promise of being quote unquote the best player.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_00: So um just an ugly, ugly series um that ends.
• 37:23
  SPEAKER_00: The rivalry kind of dies down after that.
• 37:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um and even Crosby and Giroux end up playing together um for Team Canada in the World Cup of Hockey a few years later and even say some nice things about each other.
• 37:37
  SPEAKER_00: So all the, you know, Crosby made me head surgery on my wrists and I hate the Flyers and all that stuff.
• 37:43
  SPEAKER_00: Even that kind of died down as those two guys ended up playing together and uh and sort of liking each other.
• 37:50
  SPEAKER_00: So uh meanwhile the the so the Flyers kind of go into a downslide and for the Penguins uh they never really recover under Bosma.
• 38:01
  SPEAKER_00: They make the playoffs.
• 38:03
  SPEAKER_00: The next season is shortened due to a lockout.
• 38:05
  SPEAKER_00: So uh the 2013 season doesn't start until way into the spring because of a lockout.
• 38:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um the Penguins that year actually make it all the way to the conference finals, but they're embarrassed by Boston in a series which sees the Penguins score two goals in the entire series, believe it or not.
• 38:24
  SPEAKER_00: So that's an ugly end of that season.
• 38:27
  SPEAKER_00: Uh they make it into the playoffs in 2014.
• 38:30
  SPEAKER_00: Uh they're in a second round series against the Rangers, where they're up three games to one, and they promptly melt down once again and blow the series.
• 38:39
  SPEAKER_00: And that's the end of not only Dan Bausma's time in Pittsburgh as he's fired, but also Ray Hero, the general manager who had built this the team that won the Stanley Cup in 2009.
• 38:50
  SPEAKER_02: Uh yeah, the Penguins, um, those two years, they definitely were not the better team.
• 38:55
  SPEAKER_02: They I think they lost.
• 38:56
  SPEAKER_02: I thought the three games to one series lead against the Rangers was kind of a lucky they got in some lucky breaks.
• 39:02
  SPEAKER_02: And then once the breaks went the other way, the Rangers and the Rangers went to the finals and lost.
• 39:06
  SPEAKER_02: And so did Boston.
• 39:07
  SPEAKER_02: So they lost the two better teams those years, so maybe.
• 39:10
  SPEAKER_02: But you know, sh still Balsma, you gotta upset somebody sometime, and he really hadn't in a while.
• 39:17
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it it it was just sort of bad the whole way through.
• 39:21
  SPEAKER_00: And and again, in all those series, I think i teams just found them easy to rattle.
• 39:26
  SPEAKER_00: The the Rangers series, um who was the Stahl brother that played for the Rangers?
• 39:31
  SPEAKER_00: Was that Mark Stahl?
• 39:33
  SPEAKER_00: Sounds right.
• 39:34
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, Mark Stahl just spent that whole series clubbing Crosby in the head with his stick, which was ridiculous, but that's that's what the NAKO allows to happen.
• 39:42
  SPEAKER_00: And the Penguins just couldn't, they had no answer to stuff like that.
• 39:45
  SPEAKER_02: They just Well and then the Rangers were like sentimental because Martin St.
• 39:48
  SPEAKER_02: Louis had like some tragic thing happen.
• 39:51
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I think his mother had passed away.
• 39:52
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so they could be a sentimental favorite.
• 39:55
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but the Penguins just couldn't they got rattled.
• 39:57
  SPEAKER_00: Anytime they got rattled, they just couldn't come back from it.
• 40:00
  SPEAKER_00: And so they would get, you know, they'd blow three games to one lead, or they would that series against Boston, they only scored two goals in the entire series.
• 40:09
  SPEAKER_00: So it wasn't just losing, it was like losing in a way where once somebody was inside their heads, they couldn't snap out of it.
• 40:17
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that's that more than anything to me was what ended Dan Dan Bausma's tenure.
• 40:24
  SPEAKER_00: And and it was hard to believe because, you know, we talked in that previous podcast.
• 40:28
  SPEAKER_00: He he was this great story.
• 40:30
  SPEAKER_00: He had come in, he had won a Stanley Cup in his first few months as a coach, and he eventually became the all-time winningest coach in the history of the franchise.
• 40:39
  SPEAKER_02: Well, that one year when he had didn't have Crosby or Malkin, I thought that was his best coaching job.
• 40:43
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 40:44
  SPEAKER_02: And they kind of lost, and even then they lost to Tampa, and I thought that was a little disappointing, but I thought that they even made the playoffs that year.
• 40:51
  SPEAKER_02: You briefly mentioned that year.
• 40:53
  SPEAKER_02: That was that was a good coaching job because all he had was Jordan Stahl, and they had to kind of play like a very defensive-minded game.
• 40:59
  SPEAKER_00: And they took Tampa to seven games in that series, too.
• 41:02
  SPEAKER_00: So so again, it it was you you thought he's a pretty good coach, but then I I really, to me, the series in 2012 is where everything turned.
• 41:12
  SPEAKER_00: Because they they just you talk about frauds.
• 41:16
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, they weren't a championship caliber team.
• 41:18
  SPEAKER_00: They were a team of very talented players, guys that could win heart trophies and scoring titles, but you got them in a a situation where everything was on the line and they needed to shake off something bad that happened, and they couldn't do it, whether it was Crosby or Flurry or any of these other guys.
• 41:38
  SPEAKER_00: They could they couldn't do it.
• 41:39
  SPEAKER_00: They once you got inside their heads, they they couldn't come back.
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_00: And that that really was proven in this 2012 series, and I think it was proven the next two seasons, and that was the end.
• 41:50
  SPEAKER_00: That was the end of Bosma and Shiro.
• 41:52
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, Hiro was a guy you thought would be here for forever too because he had built such a great team.
• 41:59
  SPEAKER_00: So that that's a little bit of a debacle and Mike Johnston.
• 42:04
  SPEAKER_00: I can't remember what you're saying.
• 42:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, well well what they did was they fired Hiro first, and they said, well, we're gonna let the new general manager, whoever that is, decide what happens to Bosma.
• 42:15
  SPEAKER_00: But essentially he was like fired.
• 42:17
  SPEAKER_00: So that was a whole mess.
• 42:19
  SPEAKER_00: They they had they had um brought in Mike Johnston to be the head coach.
• 42:23
  SPEAKER_00: Uh that didn't go well.
• 42:24
  SPEAKER_02: He was a complete disaster.
• 42:26
  SPEAKER_02: He was like a minor league coach, and I don't know why it didn't work out.
• 42:29
  SPEAKER_02: He was just, yeah.
• 42:31
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I think I don't even think he was a minor league coach.
• 42:33
  SPEAKER_02: I think he was a college coach.
• 42:35
  SPEAKER_02: Is that right?
• 42:36
  SPEAKER_02: No, he was, I think I'm pretty sure he was like in the Chicago, he was a minor league coach.
• 42:40
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 42:41
  SPEAKER_00: He certainly didn't have a lot of experience.
• 42:43
  SPEAKER_00: Trevor Burrus, Jr.
• 42:43
  SPEAKER_02: No, and he's never been back since.
• 42:45
  SPEAKER_02: That's uh it's not like, oh well, that guy came back.
• 42:47
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 42:48
  SPEAKER_00: And they brought in Jim Rutherford to be the GM, and that looked like a debacle at first.
• 42:52
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, because I thought I remember when I thought I thought a retread, because he had had some success in Carolina, but hadn't had any since.
• 42:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 42:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 42:59
  SPEAKER_00: So uh so that looked bad.
• 43:01
  SPEAKER_00: He and then he had come in saying he was only going to be there for a few years.
• 43:04
  SPEAKER_00: That was an odd.
• 43:05
  SPEAKER_00: Well, he's like old even.
• 43:07
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but that was just odd.
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_00: You hire a guy and he says I'm only gonna be here for three years.
• 43:11
  SPEAKER_00: Well, why did you hire that guy?
• 43:13
  SPEAKER_00: So it it it sort of looks like, again, the 2012 that 2012 debacle, everything just starts going downhill from there, and you just you're at the point where, okay, this franchise is doesn't know what it's doing, and that's Crosby and Malkin are gonna finish their career with that one Stanley Cup, and it's gonna be a lot of unrealized potential.
• 43:34
  SPEAKER_00: And then of course in 2016 they fired Johnston, promote Mike Sullivan, and win back-to-back Stanley Cups because we all saw that coming.
• 43:40
  SPEAKER_00: Because that's the way sports goes.
• 43:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 43:43
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so yeah, they do they do a lot of things.
• 43:45
  SPEAKER_02: Who knew when Mike Johnston got fired that that was going to be the beginning of a nice little run for them?
• 43:50
  SPEAKER_00: Well, and again, that's it it's the unpredictable nature of sports.
• 43:54
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so so yeah, they they bounce back.
• 43:57
  SPEAKER_00: That's that's a nice end of the story if you want to take it out that far.
• 44:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um but this series was just a mess.
• 44:05
  SPEAKER_00: And it was to me, it was a low point for sure of the Crosby Malkin kind of era.
• 44:11
  SPEAKER_02: It's kind of a role reversal where the penguins became the Flyers and the Flyers became the penguins.
• 44:15
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 44:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 44:16
  SPEAKER_00: Uh it was an ugly, ugly episode, and uh one that um I I I you know it was interesting to talk about.
• 44:25
  SPEAKER_00: Now let's never speak of it again.
• 44:27
  SPEAKER_00: Let's forget it ever happened.
• 44:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, let's forget it ever happen.
• 44:30
  SPEAKER_00: Except for on the podcast.
• 44:31
  SPEAKER_02: You can listen to it as many times as you like.
• 44:33
  SPEAKER_00: Any final thoughts on this one, Steve?
• 44:35
  SPEAKER_02: Uh like I said, uh weird role reversal.
• 44:38
  SPEAKER_02: Uh I don't know what what was that movie with Jody Foster way back uh where the mother and the daughter kind of like that, I guess.
• 44:45
  SPEAKER_02: They they change chading places there a little bit.
• 44:48
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 44:48
  SPEAKER_02: That's another movie.
• 44:49
  SPEAKER_02: But yeah.
• 44:50
  SPEAKER_02: Maybe that's what happened.
• 44:51
  SPEAKER_02: Maybe somebody maybe Hartnell.
• 44:53
  SPEAKER_02: Freaky Friday, that was it.
• 44:54
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that was it.
• 44:55
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe maybe Hartnell like morphed into Sid's body for that series.
• 45:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 45:01
  SPEAKER_00: But but yeah, definitely an ugly, ugly time, and uh and one that just again did not make you proud to be a Badwins fan.
• 45:10
  SPEAKER_00: Well, that's all we have for this episode.
• 45:12
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks everybody for listening.
• 45:14
  SPEAKER_00: Uh please uh check us out on Twitter or Instagram at Pittsburgh Sports Memories.
• 45:20
  SPEAKER_00: Please go rate us on whatever uh podcast app that you use.
• 45:24
  SPEAKER_00: And we'll be back next time.
• 45:26
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks.