He's back... again.

The moment we knew was coming has arrived. The Pittsburgh Penguins announced today that Sidney Crosby will be back in the lineup this Thursday in New York against the Rangers. What a game for the retun of Sidney Crosby. With the Pens fighting to catch the Rangers in the standings and Crosby's return, this game will surely be one not to miss. The Pens need to win both remaining games against the Rangers if they want to have a great shot at overtaking them for first in the Atlantic Division and first overall in the Eastern Conference.

While a good amount of people in the media and hockey world have been saying that with the addition of Crosby back in the Penguins lineup, the Pens are the favorites to win the Stanley Cup this year, I will not make any such comment. I will not take a chance in jinxing the team and one just never knows what will happen in the playoffs.

First, I would just like to see Crosby back in the lineup and stay in the lineup. I do not want a repeat of what happened last time, just like everyone else.
Though, I have to admit, we have an amazing team without Crosby playing, as we have seen as of late and with the addition of Crosby back... this team can be scary.
The potential of this team has me just as excited as I am at the start of a new season. In a way, if things turn out well and Crosby stays in the lineup with no symptoms, this can be like a new season in a sense.
Evgeni Malkin will hopefully stay at the same pace with Crosby back in the lineup and this team would be any other team's nightmare. Let's face it, the Pens can come out strong and knock a team down and when the Pens go down by a few goals, its not necessary to panic either because they have come out of holes to win some great games. While I will not say how deep this team will go in the playoffs, (And what does my opinion or lack thereof mean anyways?) I have to say that I am extremely excited to watch this team move forward and I hope that it is all what we are expecting. There's even a chance it will be better than we have been expecting.

With the sun shining and this warm weather, only the optimism is emerging, the glass is half full and all I am seeing are the endless great possibilities. The what ifs seem to go away; only worry about those if they happen. Now, it's time to think about this Pens team with Sidney Crosby back in uniform and adding him to an already stellar lineup. Right now, it's time to think of Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin rising to the occasion. It's time to think of this Pens team and all that they can accomplish from here on out. I don't know about you, but I am pretty excited; Thursday can not come soon enough.

False Expectations and matinee game.

As soon as the words came out of Sidney Crosby's mouth, it was established. These words inadvertently gave a target date for his return even though he adamantly said there was no date planned. Simply saying no sooner than Sunday would he return, immediately the rumors went wild stating that Crosby's return would be today against the Boston Bruins. With the schedule and practice schedule as well, I thought his return would be later than today and yesterday it was announced that Crosby's return will not be today. I am sure Crosby will think twice when choosing the way he phrases things when discussing his return because he realized the way people took what he said and ran with it. Media went wild and yesterday the story was that Crosby's return was "delayed." It was not delayed, there was no date set!
Don't worry, Crosby's retun is coming and I am sure we will know when it does. Let's not pick any more dates ourselves and set false expectations.

Now, today's game against the Boston Bruins has the chance to be a good one against the Pens and the Northeast Division leaders and second in the Eastern Conference Bruins. Even with some top players out with injury, the Bruins are still capable of scoring a lot of goals. Therefore, the Pens' defense needs to be strong today. Tuukka Rask, Boston's backup is currently in recovery that could last up to 4-6 weeks and therefore, the Bruins recently signed Marty Turco to a one year deal to back up Tim Thomas. There is a chance that Turco will be in the lineup today against the Pens. It would be his first NHL action since last February. This could be good or bad for the Pens. Either way, the Pens need to have a consistent game to continue our win streak this afternoon.

Crosby returns and does fairly well in first game.

Obviously, Sidney Crosby did better than just fairly well in his return to the Pens lineup. Someone I know called that he was going to get 4 points and this same person also predicted that Steve Sullivan would score last night. Good predictions.
Crosby scored two goals and earned two assists in last night's 5-0 win against the Islanders. In fact, his first shot of the night turned into his first goal. I'd say that is a pretty good return, pretty decent. Of course, I am being sarcastic. Only Sidney Crosby would come back from missing ten months of hockey and have such a spectacular night. Just how lucky are we as Pens fans? Well, last night's game showed us just how lucky we are.
Though, I can't wait to see the Pens against a bit of a better team than the Islanders since they are having their struggles this season.
We'll get a chance to see the team against the St. Louis Blues tomorrow night.

There was a topic brought up on several occasions, once in Crosby's press conference last night and I heard some chatter on the radio as well about the topic also. The topic was about Sidney Crosby's reaction after his first goal in last night's game. Not just the excitement but for a certain word Crosby said after scoring. Crosby said he hoped people at home were not lip reading because he happened to say a bad word, but why are people so surprised? It was good to see him happy, that's for sure and I could not care less what he muttered after that goal. People are acting as if they have never heard him say the word or in this case, see him say the word. That's how you know a lot of occasional Pens fans were watching took note. I've read that word from Crosby's mouth too many times to count. I think he earned the right to say the word after scoring last night and a lot of other times too.

It's exciting to see Crosby back and to see him do so well in his first game. The talk of the scoring race and Sid's potential of winning it is already taking place just after last night's game. Well, I don't make predictions and I tend not to think so prematurely on such things. We will just have to wait and see what happens, but I am just happy to watch Pens games like last night's game and hope they keep coming.

Pens host Islanders tonight.

The Pens have Sidney Crosby coming back and the Islanders have a player making their NHL debut tonight. It is their goalie, Nilsson. The Islanders have been plagued with some injured goaltenders quite a bit over the past few seasons and that is due in large part to Rick Dipietro pretty much always being injured and I don't need to remind any of you what happened to him last season after Brent Johnson landed a punch. Dipietro and the Islanders signed a 15 year deal years ago and that has got to be one of the biggest mistakes, he has barely even played with all he has been through.

Well, anyways, with Michalek returning as well to the lineup tonight, the defense pairings are different and Picard will be sitting tonight's game out and here are the matchups:
Martin-Michalek
Orpik-Letang
Niskanen-Engelland

Crosby will be joining his former line along with Pascal Dupuis and Chris Kunitz. Here are the lines from today's morning skate:
Sullivan-Malkin-Neal
Kunitz-Crosby-Dupuis
Cooke-Staal-Kennedy
Asham-Park-Adams

All in all, there are a few things that have me excited for tonight's game and this game has the potential to be a good one and I hope it is. Don't want to disappoint all the people watching just for Crosby's return. Let's give them a show!

He's Back!

That's right, he is back in the lineup, the moment we have all been waiting for... Zbynek Michalek is back in the lineup for tonight's game when the Pens host the New York Islanders. Oh and Sidney Crosby is also returning to the lineup tonight as well. Now, I am just as excited as the next person to have Sid back in the lineup tonight but I believe some people may be getting a tad too excited. We knew the day was coming, sooner or later, and yes, at moments the later part seemed to be the most true, but he has been taking contact and reported no side effects, so we all knew the day was coming. Except for those people who chose to believe that Sid was retiring or he would take this whole season off. However, some people out there are treating this like Easter, one would think Jesus has risen from the dead and not that Sidney was coming back from his concussion.
I understand some of the excitement and of course the attention, he has been out for so long and he is one of the best players, if not the best, player in the league. Just like everyone else, I am excited to see what the Pens can do with Sid back in the lineup since we have been doing fairly well with him out of the lineup, but let's take this slow. Though, it would not be unlike Sid to come back to his original form and just tear into scoring, I'll still give him a break and let him get acclimated to the game action that he has missed for so long. Who knows what will happen tonight, but some people are acting as if they thought he would never play again. Most of those people though could probably not name many other members of the team.

So here we are, Monday, November 21, 2011- the date of Sid's comeback and Michalek's too. We'll see what happens and I am excited to see the fresh goaltender the Islanders will have in net, Nilsson. It will be his first NHL start. Wow, first game in the NHL and it just so happens to be the game Sidney Crosby is returning after a long recovery from a concussion, talk about pressure.

Yes, I am excited to have Sid back in the lineup, thrilled even, and can't wait to see what tonight's game will bring, but for more reasons than just Sid returning to the lineup!