The Pittsburgh Penguins opened the season last night by raising their championship banner to the rafters and then dispatching the New York Rangers before yet another sell out crowd. Powered by goals by Evgeni Maklin (1), Sidney Crosby (1) and Mr. (Tyler) Kennedy (1) the Penguins downed the Rangers 3-2.

The Penguins looked good last night despite a preseason in which they won only 1 game. Of course that was because their stars were not the focus of those games and a lot of players no longer with the team were getting much of the icetime. Fleury looked sharp making some spectacular saves by flashing his glove hand and stopped 25 of 27 shots and looked like he hasn’t missed a beat since the Finals ended a few months ago.

Yes, it is still early. But this is an encouraging sign for a team that played late into the year last season and had a very short off season. The third line of Stall, Cooke and Kennedy also played yet another strong game leading me to once again call them the best third line in all of hockey. They cycled, checked, and shot like a top line at many times and that is what you like to see from guys on the #3 line. I was also happy to see that Bylsma decided to keep Kennedy on the third line rather than move him up to the second line. Dupuis played there most of the night instead. Kennedy is a great fit for the third line and while I have no doubt that he can play on the second line with Malkin, his chemistry with his current linemates should not be sacrificed.

Today the Penguins are in New York to play the Islanders in the second game of the season. The Islanders have not taken to the ice yet in the regular season so far.

After resolving some technical difficulties with the site that have prevented me from posting for the past week, counting up hundred of emails from visitors who could not get our poll software to work and sorting through and deleting some late votes that somehow snuck by when the poll failed to auto close on the 14th, the results the first annual Mr. Hockeyburgh award have been tabulated.

And the winner is … MISTERRRRRRRRRRR KENNEDY!

Tyler Kennedy received 29.3% of the vote and edged out playoff MVP Geno Malkin (23.6%) for this year’s award.

Coming in third was former Penguin Rob Scuderi (19.3%) and rounding out the voting was Marc-Andre Fleury (14.7%) and Bill Guerin (13.1%).

Tyler Kennedy has proven to be a fan favorite all year long with his high energy play and aggressive play in the offensive zone. There is no doubt in my mind that he is worthy of this award.

Congratulations Mr. Kennedy! And don’t let the award go to your head.

The gauntlet that is the 2009-2010 Penguins schedule has been released and it opens Friday, October 2nd at home against the New York Rangers where the Penguins will raise their Stanley Cup Champion Banner! The season ends April 11th at New York against the Islanders.

Notable games that I will plan on attending are:

• Both Toronto games at home (December 27th and March 28th) because I do so enjoy the way the fans from up north down the alcohol and get rowdy.
• The Detroit game on Sunday January 31st
• Both Montreal games at home (October 28th and November 25th) for the same reasons as I will be at the Toronto games
• Every Philadelphia game this season just because I do so hate the Flyers (December 15th, January 7th and March 27th)
• And of course I will be going to the March 20th game against Carolina to celebrate my birthday

The new baby (Magnus Wayne) is due early in October so I will have to see how many games I will be able to make with two kids.  But I have already told my wife that she is forbidden from going into labor on October 2nd.  Before or after is fine, but not on the day we raise the banner to the rafters!  I don’t care if we have to rush to the hospital right after the game, just hold him in there honey!

To download a copy of the complete schedule click here.

Ok, I just got myself out of bed after a night of sound sleep resting easy knowing that the Stanley Cup was heading back here to Pittsburgh. Now that my head has cleared I am ready to give my thoughts about not just Game 7 but also the entire Stanley Cup Finals and playoffs.

• “That’s life” – Yes, it certainly is isn’t it Mr. Hossa. When asked about how it felt loosing the cup again after bolting from the Penguins to the team he felt had a better chance at securing Hockey’s ultimate prize this is what he had to say about it. Karma sucks huh?
• Hockey is an odd sport. Sure Penguins booed the Hossa every chance we had after he spurned the Penguins for Detroit, but we respect him because we know how good of a player he is. It was like when Jagr left the team. He was booed constantly on the ice but when they showed video highlights of him and tributes to his successes even while he was on the visiting team we cheered him … then we went right back to booing him. We all wish Hossa success in the future … just not against the Penguins.
• Hossa not only did not get the Stanley Cup he so desperately wanted, but he was for all intents and purposes a complete non-factor in the Finals. You think Pittsburgh Fans were hard on him? Wait until Detroit gets through tearing him a new @**hole. He won’t be able to get out of Detroit fast enough.
• Who would have thought that Maxime Talbot would be this year’s Fedotenko and score both the Penguins goals in the final game? And who would have thought that Mad Max would be the series leader in goals with four?
• During the Penguin’s first Stanley Cup run in 1990-1991 Frank Pietrangelo made what became known as “The Save” subbing for the legendary Tom Barrasso in Game 6 of the first round against New Jersey and robbed Petr Stastny of an easy goal. This year I think we have The Save II and The Save III and The Save IV. The Save II was when Fleury robbed Ovechkin in Game 7 of the second round in Washington to suck the air out of the Capitals. The Save III was by Rob Scudderi in Game 6 as he prevented the tying goal with Fleury out of position in the final moments. The Save IV was Fleury leaping like superman from the far post with the final two seconds ticking away, lept into the air to stop an elevated puck shot by Lindstrom and saving the game from going into extra frames.
• No Crosby? No Problem. Sidney Crosby was knocked out of the game for all intents and purposes by a fairly clean check by Johan Franzen. It was a tense moment for the Penguins as Crosby would return to play only one shift in the third. But the team rallied and played hard even if they did D-up too much in the third and gave Detroit far too many opportunities.
• 6:07 – that’s when I started to get really worried after Fluery let in another soft goal to allow the Wings to cut the lead to in half and be within one.
• Thank God for the posts. The posts were in play all series long. Early on in the series the Penguins were the victims of every bad bounce off of them. In Game 7, late, it was the crossbar that made one of the biggest saves against the Red Wings to keep me from being even more anxious than I already was.
• Penguins evolved when they needed to in this series. The Red Wings made it clear that they were not going to allow the Penguins to play their brand of up and down the ice high octane hockey. So they adapted, turned into a checking monster and hit like most Pens fans have never seen before.

My Three Stars of the Game:

3rd star: The crossbar

Hey, it made a great save in the waining moments!

2nd star: Max Talbot

With the only two goals of the game Max unquestionably deserves this honor.

1st star: Marc-Andre Fleury

I don’t care what you say, despite the vast amount of improvement Fleury still needs to make in the coming years (he needs to get much better handling the puck and with his glove hand on the high side) Fleury blossomed and saved this series with performances in Games 6 and 7 that make him worthy of the 1st star.

Series MVP:

I’m giving this honor to our two best goal tenders – Fleury and Scuderi. Without Fleury’s glove and without Scuderi sacrificing his body constantly, the Penguins would never have won this series.

Player I am happiest for:

Bill Guerin. I love this guy. He plays hockey the way it should be played and was a great addition to this team at the trade deadline.

What I hope for most:

Well, other than another Stanley Cup, I hope the Penguins and many of the pieces of this team can come to agreeable terms to keep the Champs mostly in tact moving forward. Scuderi, Fedotenko and Guerin are all free agents and are key parts to this team. They are not irreplaceable and I have not seen a list of free agents yet, but keeping all of them would be a boost. But Scuderi put on a clinic in the playoffs and will have teams falling all over themselves to sign him. I hope that Fed and Billy will decide to stay on for next year. Miro Satan and Petr Sykora are also players I would like to see come back, but honestly I do not see the Penguins paying Miro the kind of money they currently are to play on the fourth line – a role I think he blossomed at this year once put into it.

And just for good measure I want to say it once more …

THE STANLEY CUP CHAMPION PITTSBURGH PENGUINS!