Saturday, June 13, 2009

Ladies and Gentlemen, Your Stanley Cup Champions Pittsburgh Penguins

When the dust settled and the horn sounded, the Pittsburgh Penguins stood tall with Sir Lord Stanley's Cup. What a beautiful sight to behold. All Hail the Pens!

I was more nervous than a whore in church. Game seven is it. All the marbles. Winner take all.

Pens goalie Marc-Andre Fleury was unbelievable again. I can't say enough good things about him. The way he rebounded from that 5-0 thrashing in game five was incredible. When the Pens needed Flower the most, he stood tall. He stonewalled shot after shot in games six and seven. In the closing seconds of game seven, he made one last stop to avoid overtime and win the Cup for the Pens.

Maxine Talbot also came up big in game seven. He made the best of two opportunities by putting the puck past Detroit Red Wings goalie Chris Osgood. The first was on a turnover that went off Pens start Evgeni Malkin. Talbot took the rebound and found the back of the net. Latter, on a two on one play, Talbot chose to shoot versus passing the puck. He scored the two goals for the Pens. It was all the scoring they needed.

For the Pens it was the role players that stepped it up a notch. Sidney Crosby only had one goal and two assists during the Finals. In game seven, he was injured on a legal hit in the second. The Pens sucked it up and played on without him. He tried to come back on the ice but wasn't able to move around much. Instead of staying out and becoming a liability, he stayed on the bench and let his teammates finish up.

The Red Wings played strong obviously. They started the series fast by going up 2-0 but were unable to put the Pens away. For his part, goalie Osgood was fantastic. Osgood has his critics but anyone who blames him for the series loss is either blind or doesn't know hockey.

I thank both teams for an incredible back and forth series. It was exciting hockey and a great final series.

As a Pens fan, I'm on cloud nine today. Fans and media began to write the Pens off, as did I, when they were tenth in the play off race. They fired the head coach and made a charge all the way up to the fourth seed. It was a roller coaster season that ended on the ultimate high for Pens fans.

Thank you Pittsburgh Penguins for an outstanding season.

See you all next season.

Go Pens!

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My Sports Allegiances

My favorite teams are in no particular order: Houston Texans, San Antonio Spurs(NBA champs 99, 03, 05, 07, 14) and the Houston Cougars, Pittsburgh Penguins (Stanley Cups 91, 92, 08, 16, 17)
My secondary teams are: Houston Dynamo(MLS Champs 06, 07), Houston Astros (NL Champs 05), Houston Rockets (NBA Champs 94, 95)
Teams I Hate: Anything out of Dallas
Teams I Enjoy Seeing Lose: Texas Longhorns, Texas A&M Aggies, Baylor Bears football
Teams that are Insignificant: rice owls