After losing No. 1 defenseman Sergei Gonchar to a broken a wrist over a week ago, the Pittsburgh Penguins will be without another top player as the reigning NHL scoring champion, Evgeni Malkin, will be out of the lineup for two-to-three weeks with a shoulder strain.
According to head coach Dan Bylsma the injury happened roughly 10 days ago, and sitting him out is a precautionary move at this point.
Pittsburgh Penguins general manager Ray Shero was kind enough to spend nearly an hour on the phone with FanHouse's Adam Gretz discussing a variety of topics. This is the third of a three-part series. Wednesday's entry: Ray Shero discusses how the 2009-10 Penguins were built through free agency, trades, the draft, and what he expects from the defending Stanley Cup champions.
Coming out of the NHL lockout prior to the 2005-06 season, the Pittsburgh Penguins took a New York Rangers-like dive into the free agency pool, signing high-profile players Sergei Gonchar, John Leclair, Zigmund Palffy, Mark Recchi and Jocelyn Thibault. Playoff hopes were higher than they were in any of the previous three seasons, and the hype machine was spinning out of control. As it turns out, the season was nothing short of a disaster, salvaged only by the rookie performance of Sidney Crosby and the fact it resulted in the No. 2 overall pick the following summer, used to select Jordan Staal.
Palffy retired halfway through the season, and Leclair and Recchi were dumped over the course of the next two seasons. The one player that worked out and is still with the team today? Gonchar, and they're a completely different team without him.
Since taking over the behind the Penguins' bench in mid-February, Dan Bylsma could do no wrong during his head coaching debut in Pittsburgh. His hiring, combined with the return of defenseman Sergei Gonchar, and the in-season acquisitions of Chris Kunitz, Bill Guerin and Craig Adams, helped the Penguins win their first Stanley Cup in 17 years.
It's officially the offseason, meaning the time is right to look into the future. We continue our division-by-division preview of the potential wheeling and dealing with the Atlantic Division.
It will be an interesting summer for the five teams in the Atlantic. Four teams made the playoffs, including the eventual Stanley Cup champion, and the one team that didn't make it -- the New York Islanders -- holds the first pick in Friday's draft, which isn't a bad consolation prize. All around it was a pretty successful season for these five teams.
The real NHL awards will be handed out Thursday night in Las Vegas, so FanHouse decided to hand out its own special awards for the 2008-09 season.
It's designed to maintain competitive balance and parity across the league, but if you waste valuable salary cap space on free agents that don't pan out or contribute the way you expected, you're pretty much stuck without a paddle because nobody is going to bail you out and take that albatross contract off your hands.
Introducing the FanHouse nominees for the Wade Redden Award for Wasted Cap Space.
It's officially the offseason, meaning the time is right to look into the future. We'll be running our division-by-division preview of the offseason beginning later in the week, but we wanted to give the two top dogs their own space. Yesterday we took a look at the Red Wings. Today: the summer outlook for the Pittsburgh Penguins.
Thanks to Max Talbot's two-goal performance in Game 7, along with Marc-Andre Fleury's buzzer-beating save on Nicklas Lidstrom, the Pittsburgh Penguins brought home their third Stanley Cup. General manager Ray Shero now has the task of dealing with 10 unrestricted free agents and finding a way to construct a team that is capable of keeping the Cup in Pittsburgh.
It's not quite a "nearly catastrophic testicle injury," but Penguins defenseman Sergei Gonchar had his own set of problems during the Stanley Cup playoffs. After being involved in a knee-to-knee collision with Washington's Alex Ovechkin in the Eastern Conference semifinals, the Penguins' No. 1 defenseman suffered a partially torn MCL that sidelined him for just two games. Had the same injury occurred in, say, November, it probably would have kept him out of the lineup for a couple of months.
It's the second major injury of the season for the 35-year-old Gonchar, as he missed the first four-and-a-half months of the season due to a shoulder injury suffered in a preseason game against the Tampa Bay Lightning.
The Pittsburgh Penguins ended a 17-year Stanley Cup drought on Friday night with a 2-1 win over the Detroit Red Wings, giving the franchise its third championship. While current general manager Ray Shero will get his name on the cup for overseeing the hockey operations the past three seasons, former general manager Craig Patrick also had a hand in putting this team together.
After the jump, a player-by-player look at how the 2008-09 Penguins were built over the years.
So I'm watching the morning Sportscenter, and after going through the highlights of Friday's Game 7, I hear Neil Everett drop the following line: "I just Googled Max Talbot to find out more about him and the first thing I find is a bunch of pictures of him shirtless, kissing girls, so he must be the dude."
Now you know, Neil. Now you know. With his performance in Pittsburgh's 2-1 win on Friday night, Talbot wrote his chapter in Penguins history by scoring both goals in the deciding game of the Stanley Cup final. While this puts him on the NHL map, he's has been a superstar in Pittsburgh for the past two seasons, not only for his gritty, hard-working style of play, but for his flawless performances as a spokesperson (sort of) for A & L Motors in Pittsburgh.
After losing No. 1 defenseman Sergei Gonchar to a broken a wrist over a week ago, the Pittsburgh Penguins will be without another top player as the reigning NHL scoring champion, Evgeni Malkin, will be out of the lineup for two-to-three weeks with a shoulder strain. 
FanHouse's Adam Gretz takes a look at his top 50 players in the NHL. No. 29 is Pittsburgh Penguins defenseman Sergei Gonchar.
Since taking over the behind the Penguins' bench in mid-February, Dan Bylsma could do no wrong during his head coaching debut in Pittsburgh. His hiring, combined with the return of defenseman Sergei Gonchar, and the in-season acquisitions of Chris Kunitz, Bill Guerin and Craig Adams, helped the Penguins win their first Stanley Cup in 17 years. 
It's officially the offseason, meaning the time is right to look into the future. We continue our division-by-division preview of the potential wheeling and dealing with the Atlantic Division. 
The real NHL awards will be handed out Thursday night in Las Vegas, so FanHouse decided to hand out its own special awards for the 2008-09 season.
Thanks to Max Talbot's two-goal performance in Game 7, along with Marc-Andre Fleury's buzzer-beating save on Nicklas Lidstrom, the Pittsburgh Penguins brought home their third Stanley Cup. General manager Ray Shero now has the task of dealing with 10 unrestricted free agents and finding a way to construct a team that is capable of keeping the Cup in Pittsburgh.
It's not quite a "nearly catastrophic testicle injury," but Penguins defenseman Sergei Gonchar had his own set of problems during the Stanley Cup playoffs. After being involved in a knee-to-knee collision with Washington's Alex Ovechkin in the Eastern Conference semifinals, the Penguins' No. 1 defenseman suffered a partially torn MCL that sidelined him for just two games. Had the same injury occurred in, say, November, it probably would have kept him out of the lineup for a couple of months. 
