Will the Pittsburgh Penguins Express Derail Early in 2008?

Was it really only two seasons ago that the hockey world gave the Pittsburgh Penguins so little chance of making the playoffs?

Coming off a horrible season, the loss of veterans, and the re-retirement of Mario Lemieux, it looked like playoff contention might be a couple of years away for the talented-but-young next generation of Penguins.

After a slow start in 2006, the Penguins caught fire down the stretch. As the regular season wrapped up, they made the playoffs as one of the hottest teams in the Eastern Conference. Although they were rudely dispatched in the first round by an experienced and determined Ottawa Senators team that went on to the Stanley Cup Finals, the vast improvement over the previous year was downright historic.

By 2007, it was clear that the young guns had bought into Coach Michel Therrien's system and that Pittsburgh was on the rise—so much so that the fans were elbowing for room on the shiny new Penguins Bandwagon.

Ticket sales shot up—way up—the next year, leading to a first-ever waiting list for Penguins Season Tickets. The stated goal in 2007 was contending for a Cup. Once unthinkable, that goal now seemed realistic, at least to the team and its fans—even if a bit of a stretch to everyone else.

Unexpectedly perhaps, Pittsburgh stumbled out of the gate last season. The talk quickly shifted from winning the Cup to just making the playoffs. Then, when Sidney Crosby and Marc-Andre Fleury were both lost for an extended time, the mainstream thinking was that they just had to find a way to hold on to their dwindling playoff hopes until the superstars could return.

Hockey analysts concluded that the Penguins would not match the regular-season record from the year before, and suggested the playoffs might slip away.

However, Pittsburgh flourished during the next month or so, playing so well that some folks actually wondered if the return of Crosby and Fleury might disrupt that success. I would venture to say that 100 percent of coaches in the league would be willing to take that chance.

The final twist in the eventual success story of the 2007 Penguins was the last-minute acquisition of Marian Hossa to play alongside Sidney Crosby. That brilliant trade paid dividends in the playoffs, and Pittsburgh stormed through the Eastern Conference with a vengeance, only to fall in the end to the stronger and vastly more experienced Detroit Red Wings.

Even though the Pens seemed to get their feet under them after Game Two of that series, the eventual outcome was never really in doubt.

At the time, some folks questioned the Hossa deal, and when Hossa signed with the Red Wings after last season, they questioned it even more. Make no mistake—put that deal squarely in the "brilliant

You're currently logged into Facebook

Do you want to share your Bleacher Report activity on Facebook?