Congrats NHL Champs Pittsburgh Penguins!

[irv]

Originally Posted by samosa4u

Here are my thoughts on Penguins winning the cup:

First off, let me discuss the disallowed Nashville goal in the 2nd period. Now although I was rooting for the Penguins, I am going to admit that it was a bad call. The ref clearly lost sight of the puck and blew the play dead when he shouldn't have. It was clear that the other refs weren't happy with this call either. Now there is just one question I have: did the Penguins players hear the whistle and stop playing? Did the Penguins goalie hear the whistle and stop playing? Because if they did stop playing, then allowing the goal would have been really bad. Either way, this will always be a controversial call and fans will discuss this for a long time.

It seemed to me that the refs tried to make up for this mistake afterwards by awarding Nashville power plays. They were given at least 4 PPs, including a 5 vs. 3 opportunity, however they failed to score a single goal. Penguins weren't given a single PP the whole night. Furthermore, Nashville didn't score a single goal in game 5 either and Pekka Rinne couldn't stop an inflatable beach volleyball from getting past him in Pittsburgh - all of this is the reason why the team failed to win.

Now here is what surprised me: the Penguins won the cup without their #1 defenseman (Kris Letang). Imagine how Nashville would have looked like without Subban. What about an Ottawa team without Erik Karlsson or LA Kings without Drew Doughty? All those goals scored against the Penguins were due to Letang not being there, and yet they still found a way to win. This is very impressive.

Now the only thing which I didn't understand is why did the NHL award Crosby the Conn Smythe trophy? Was he the best player on his team during this playoff run? I don't think so. Now I am not trying to take anything away from him here. He was concussed (again!) and yet he came back after only a few days rest and fought like a true warrior, however, did he deserve it more than Malkin and rookie forward Jake Guentzel?

Anyways, congrats to the people of Pittsburgh. First you had Lemieux and Jagr win you two cups, and then Crosby and Malkin won you another three. You guys are very lucky to have gotten such amazing players in the draft. This is a really exciting time to be a hockey fan in the city of Pittsburgh.

And to the Nashville fans, you guys have been great. It's great to see hockey getting some love in the south. I know many of you went nuts last night and I don't blame you. You guys came so close, so this is definitely something that will sting for a long time. Anyhow, you have a very deadly team and I won't be surprised if you win it all next year.

Well said, but I also think with Fiala and Johansen being out, they were in way tougher than Pittsburgh was yet still did great. The disallowed goal was definitely a game changer, but it's water under the bridge now.

[Snapolit1]

A website dedicated to sports card collectors and you can't get 5 people to respond to a thread on the NHL championship series. Everything you need to know about the 4th tier status of hockey in the US. You could get 5 people on this board to discuss a tiddlywinks champion from 1925.

[quinnsryche]

Maybe I should have included the phrase "shill bidding" or T206 in the title.

[Writehooks]

The Penguins beat long odds to become the first back-to-back Stanley Cup champions in 19 years ... and the first in the cap era. And Crosby and Malkin only solidified their standing as the best 1-2 punch in the league. Malkin's performance underlined the absurdity of leaving him off the list of the NHL's all-time "100 greatest," which was unveiled as part of the league's centennial celebration earlier this year. Malkin is twice the player Darryl Sittler ever was (he made the list). Sittler, Borje Salming and Brendan Shanahan could easily be replaced by the likes Malkin, Mark Recchi, Steve Shutt, Rod Langway and Guy Lapointe -- to name just a few.

[samosa4u]

Originally Posted by Snapolit1

A website dedicated to sports card collectors and you can't get 5 people to respond to a thread on the NHL championship series. Everything you need to know about the 4th tier status of hockey in the US. You could get 5 people on this board to discuss a tiddlywinks champion from 1925.

A lot of hockey fans I know hate the Penguins, so I'm not surprised this thread got very few replies.

Originally Posted by quinnsryche

Maybe I should have included the phrase "shill bidding" or T206 in the title.

Or "PWCC, READ THIS RIGHT NOW!!!"

Originally Posted by Writehooks

Malkin's performance underlined the absurdity of leaving him off the list of the NHL's all-time "100 greatest," which was unveiled as part of the league's centennial celebration earlier this year. Malkin is twice the player Darryl Sittler ever was (he made the list).

Yep, that is so stupid. How many cups did loser Sittler win for Toronto? ZERO!

[blackandgold]

[QUOTE=samosa4u;1670880]A lot of hockey fans I know hate the Penguins, so I'm not surprised this thread got very few replies.


Which is why I hesitated to post lol. I'm a life long Pens fan, but don't want to get jumped on for saying anything positive about them. It's cool to have people on this board who just talk hockey without the constant slagging you get seemingly everywhere else.

I was really surprised they won this year with all the injuries they had.