Streaks and Confused Monkeys:

The Streak has ended

The 12 game point streak has ended for Marc Andre Fleury and the Pens. And the Ratt has entered a period of meditation to once again center himself with the Hockey Universe. Actually the guys didn't play badly, and the Phlyers didn't play better than the Pens, they just got an unbelievable game out of Marty Biron, (and how often does that actually happen against the Pens?) Most of the time Biron is a Central European Dairy Product (Swiss Cheese) to the Pens snipers, but not Sunday. Kris Le-tank scored the only goal for the Flightless ones, but the rubber was flying (28 shots) and the energy was up we just needed to crack Biron with a pipe or something. But we can't bitch (doesn't mean we won't) out of the 34 possible points available to the Pens since Coach Dan took the reins the guys have managed to lasso 27 of them, go from a distant 10th to a semi-solid 5th with a decent chance for 4th place before the last 8 games have been played. (Philly has 11 games left) We were bound to lose one or two, I just hate that it was Philthy we lost to, but it just gives me more to hate them for. (hey, that kinda rhymed!)

Better Hockey Stuff: Call him Evgeni, Geno, The Incredible Malk, or the Beast From the East(-ern Conference) Malkin is 10 points ahead and has 5 assists more than El Capitan and has been picked the League's Second Star for his 3 goal 5 assist, 8 point run last week. That Cam Ward dude was First Star, and Shane Doan (All Star Shoot-Out winner) caught the Third Star honors. Guess those Blogger-verse guys were wrong about the suspension too, huh?

Kinda Not so Good News: The Buffaslugs have kind of been struggling without the services of Amp Energy Drink commercial star Ryan (yo mama) Miller. Well, Miller started skating with the team today, he doesn't give any timetable for his return, but you've got to know he'll be pushing it with the 'Slug's play-off chances floating out into Erie with the rest of the Buffalo sewage. They're a much better team with him in, and there are enough teams knotted up in this play-off race, I don't need another one to keep track of.

What the....?: Speaking of teams we forgot to watch, the Ottawa Senators have somehow managed to claw their way out of the basement and now hold 11th place in the East. Just 2 points behind the aforementioned Buffaslugs. They've won 5 games in a row, including one against the NY Rags (thank you very much). Of all the weird things that have happened in the standings this year, this might be the weirdest.

Riding The Learning Curve

Marc-Andre Fleury may be just 23 years of age, but there can be little doubt that he has put himself up with the best goalies in the game with his play this spring. Since returning to the Penguins lineup in late February MAF was arguably the best goalie in the NHL until the clock hit all zeros at the end of Game 6 of the Stanley Cup Finals.

With that in mind, I thought I would compare Fleury's performance up to this point in his career to other current goalies in the NHL to see how he compared to what they had accomplished by age 23. Below you will see a statistical breakdown for most of the NHL's current top netminders at age 23:

Marc-Andre Fleury

• Regular Season: 173 GP, 76-67-19, 2.95 GAA, .905 SV%, 11 SO
  
• Playoffs: 25 GP, 15-10, 2.30 GAA, .922 SV%, 3 SO
  

Martin Brodeur

• Regular Season: 168 GP, 82-53-26, 2.40 GAA, .910 SV%, 12 SO
  
• Playoffs: 38 GP, 24-14, 1.86 GAA, .926 SV%, 4 SO
  

Roberto Luongo

• Regular Season: 194 GP, 55-105-19, 2.73 GAA, .916 SV%, 16 SO
  
• Playoffs: none
  

J.S. Giguere

• Regular Season: 64 GP, 19-31-7, 2.86 GAA, .904 SV%, 4 SO
  
• Playoffs: none
  

Rick DiPietro

• Regular Season: 80 GP, 28-38-8, 2.71 GAA, .900 SV%, 5 SO
  
• Playoffs: 6 GP, 1-4, 2.08 GAA, .911 SV%, 1 SO
  

Ryan Miller

• Regular Season: 18 GP, 6-11-1, 3.03 GAA, .886 SV%, 1 SO
  
• Playoffs: none
  

Henrik Lundqvist

• Regular Season: 53 GP, 30-12-9, 2.24 GAA, .922 SV%, 2 SO
  
• Playoffs: 3 GP, 0-3, 4.41 GAA, .835 SV%
  

Note: I was going to include Evgeni Nabokov, Marty Turco, and Mikka Kiprusoff in this comparison, but none of them had made an NHL appearance by age 23.

There were a few interesting observations I made while putting these numbers together. Some of them are quite obvious, but others are a little more subtle. Of all the players above, Martin Brodeur is the only one to have won a Stanley Cup by age 23. At the same time, Marc-Andre Fleury is the only one of the players looked at to have a 40-win season to his credit by age 23. Fleury and Brodeur are also the only two to have won at least one playoff round by age 23. It bears noting though that Rick DiPietro's playoff stats suggest that he was hardly to blame for his team's failure to advance in the post-season in 2003-04.

So what does this all mean? To me these numbers validate the thought that Marc-Andre Fleury is on the verge of establishing himself as one of the best goalies in the NHL for many years to come. His number compare very favorably to those of Brodeur and Roberto Luongo and I think most people would agree that they have both turned out to be pretty solid players in their own right. MAF's goals against average (GAA) may not be up to the standard of those two early in their careers, but you have to take into account the teams they were playing behind to put those numbers in perspective. Brodeur inherited the net for a veteran Devils team that was primed to become one of the powers in the NHL for many years to come, and Luongo played on some teams that while not that great still had some talent and play defensive oriented systems. Fleury on the other hand played behind Penguins teams that were downright awful, especially defensively, for most of his career. MAF never really had the luxury of playing behind a good defensive team until just this past season.

There are all kinds of variables that need to be taken into account here. For instance, Brodeur would likely have a few more wins to his name had the OT shootout been in place at the start of his career, but at the same time the style of hockey in the NHL at that time was much more favorable to goaltenders that what we see today. While I'm sure 100 people could look at these numbers and walk away with 100 different conclusions, I continue to have the overwhelming sense that Marc-Andre Fleury's future is incredibly bright. When you take into account the talent around him in Pittsburgh and the improvements he has made to his game MAF could be in a position to make a run at the NHL record for career wins before all is said and done. Regardless of lofty goals like that, it is clear that Fleury is ahead of the curve compared to most of his peers and the Penguins should be set in goal for quite a long time once they get MAF signed to a new contract.