Penguins are Go!:

It might (?) be a little early in the year to start touting the numbers, but with Saturdays win against the hard to beat NY Long-Islanders Mark-Andre Fleury and the Penguins seem to be off to a good start. Flower's save percentage (.909) for the first two games puts him right in the middle of the pack, but his winning percentage (100%) puts him right at the top of the list. Ok, I don't much believe in stats, but the winning thing is a stat you can't argue with. In my humble, but all knowing, opinion at least 4 out of the 5 goals that the Flower allowed can be attributed to defensive breakdowns and shouldn't be held against the Tower of Flower Power. I wonder if we can get the League to adjust the stats accordingly. There were times in both games where the newly revamped Flower Protection League looked a little rusty out there, but that goes for the whole team as there were times when the rust was showing on the shininess that should be the Pens attack.I suppose it's a bit much to expect late season flash and cohesion from the team during the first two games of the season. But I don't care, I want it, and I want it now! Is my addiction showing?


Flower was showing no rust at all with this save Fri. against Vinny Prospal though...


Flower was pulling some amazing saves in both games, including a diving poke-check on Tambellini in the Isles game, and I'll be posting more of them as soon as NHL.com pulls out of their coma and starts posting them on their site. For the most part MAF is still showing everyone the same form that helped the Pens to back to back SCF runs. Basically he's Gumby in goalie gear and he's certainly got the split/flash the gove save thing going. I'd swear there was a save in each game that was a mirror of the one he pulled on O'Retchkin in the Play-Offs last season. Flower was perfection in the Shoot-out shutting out Tavares and Tambillini, and Le-Tank and El Sid buried both of theirs sealing the game.

Other Stuff: Couple of milestones, El Sid scored his 400th point in the second game of his fourth season in the League (don't listen to Error, he can't count) making him the 6th fastest to reach that mark. John Tavares scored his first point and then goal in the NHL which drove everyone in the arena nuts. Who knows how many more he's going to get. And the entire hockey world was subjected to the entire FSN broadcast team for the opener as the NHL Channel was taking a direct feed from FSN and showing everyone the kind of Goofball you have to be to broadcast hockey in Pittsburgh. (sorry guys, we didn't pick them, we just have to watch em) I missed the guys for some reason, but I've already found that I'm already saying 'Shut up Bob' without even knowing that I've done it.

On a Side Note: One interesting trend is that Eric Godard is getting more action during the first periods of the first two games than he got all during the Cup run last season. I believe I counted at least 5 fights during the first periods of the 2 games, and Godard was involved in 2 of them. Although the Isles seem to just want to get into a big hugging match when they fight, so I'm not sure they should count. Also, I'm wondering where Jay McKee got his 'Get out of Game Misconduct Free' card, and can we get a couple dozen of those for the rest of the season. It seems that on the Island the refs have ADD and Alzheimer's because all Jay seemingly had to do was duck out of the game for ten or fifteen minutes and then he was allowed to jump back on the ice. Let me set the scene: Feds was zipping toward the offensive blueline, looking for Geno to pass the puck to when he was levelled cleanly by Witt of the Isles. Geno, who's normally Witt's favorite Penguin target, took exception and bashed the Wittster into the boards. Arm goes up, penalty coming on Malk. Dupuis also doesn't seem like much of a Witt fan because he grabbed the defenseman and as he was dropping the gloves to show some hockey-love, McKee jumps in, pushes Duper out of the way and starts wailing on Witt. Ref, doesn't have enough arms for all the penalties, but a flock of Pens are going to the box. McKee and Feds go to the locker room, Malkin goes to the box, and Guerin goes in for McKee, joining Godard who's still serving his penalty. So, 5 of the 18 guys that are supposed to be out on the ice are now unavailable, and McKee is supposed to be out for the game......bad news, right? One PP goal scored, Geno comes out, then Guerin and Godard get out, Feds comes back at the start of the second and halfway through the next period the Kee-ster sneaks back in and starts playing as if nothing happened. 19 penalty minutes in the first period launches Jay into first in that category, but that's all that happened. Wild.