Quite the forgettable road trip, but at least Sid got his name in the record books again.
Here are your Pens Points for this Friday morning…
The Pittsburgh Penguins and Buffalo Sabres tussled Thursday night in upstate New York. Stop me if you have heard this before: the opposition scored on their first shot of the game. The game started in the worst possible way and didn’t improve from there. [Highlights]
The only positive of a 7-3 loss was Sidney Crosby etching his name into the history books again. The captain scored the Penguins’ first goal of the game and, in doing so, recorded his 20th consecutive point-per-game season, becoming the first player in NHL history to accomplish the feat. Crosby passed Wayne Gretzky to own the record by himself. [KDKA]
Crosby’s big, season-long milestone has been reached, but Bryan Rust and Rickard Rakell are also gunning for personal milestones as the season winds down. [PensBurgh]
News and notes from around the NHL…
Big news out of the eastern side of Pennsylvania: the Philadelphia Flyers on Thursday fired head coach John Tortorella. Of note, Torts said after Philly’s 7-2 loss to the Toronto Maple Leafs on Tuesday that he was not “interested in learning how to coach in this type of season, where we’re at right now.” [NHL]
With Tortorella out of Philadelphia, could Vancouver Canucks head coach Rick Tocchet, int the final year of his coaching contract, return to his former team? [TSN]
Brad Marchand, acquired by the Florida Panthers at the NHL trade deadline, has not played in a game since March 1 due to injury. He said he was ‘dying to get into’ a game with his new team and may have his wish answered as soon as Friday night. [NHL]
Alex Ovechkin didn’t record a goal for the Washington Capitals on Thursday night. But he made sure all of the Capitals players returned to the ice after the game ended to shake hands with soon-to-be-retired goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury. [AP]