The Penguins had four days off after returning home from their Sweden excursion with the Ottawa Senators.  The NHL wanted to avoid the travel weariness that the Anaheim Ducks exhibited last season.

However, the Penguins had their opener tonight against the New Jersey Devils and really played a sloppy, uninspired game.

It’s plainly obvious that it’s going to take some time for this group of Penguins to mesh and get some kind of chemistry flowing, because there is precious little of that happening right now.

The first period was played at a very crisp, fast and physical pace between both teams.  As a result, the customary fisticuffs ensued between new Pen Eric Godard and the Devils’ David Clarkson, which I’d have to say was probably a draw due to boredom.

The fans primary reason for angst during the first two games, the powerplay, actually was a bright spot for the Penguins early on.  A one-timer from the center point from Evgeni Malkin bounced around the feet of a few skaters in front of Devils’ goalie Marty Brodeur.  Jordan Staal pushed the puck on his backhand to Miro Satan, who was wide open on the right side to bang it in the back of the net to make it 1-0 Penguins midway through the first period.

However, the second period saw the Devils raise their intensity and their shot totals.  The Devils, never to be confused with an offensive juggernaut, outshot the Penguins 15-4 during the second period.  If it were not for the stellar play of Pens’ goalie Marc-Andre Fleury, they surely would have at least tied the game.  But Fleury stood tall and the Penguins remained in the lead after two periods 1-0.

The lack of offense by the Penguins continued in the third period, as the Devils again outshot the Penguins 20-2.  But in spite of the one-sided shot count, the Penguins were under three minutes away from absolutely stealing a win from the Devils.  That was spoiled by a very fortunate bounce from a wrister by Patrik Elias that deflected off the skate of Hal Gill and into the net to tie the game at one with 2:29 remaining in the third period.  The Penguins were able to hold any further damage and at least got the game into overtime.

The overtime was more of the same, with more shots being passed up.  With the shootout looming, Zach Parise fired a wrister to the top shelf and past Fleury to give the Devils the win.

The final shot count was Devils 49, Penguins 15.

• The powerplay ended up going 1 for 4.  It appeared that they were able to set up  in the Devils’ zone a little better than in the two games against Ottawa.
• Hal Gill tangled with Clarkson in the second period and did not fare very well.
• It was obvious that the ice surface in Sweden played a significant part in the sloppy conditions last week for the Penguins, but they couldn’t use that excuse tonight.

The Flyers are up next for the Penguins on Tuesday night.

The Badger is surely looking down and smiling today.

The Penguins announced today the unveiling of their new marketing theme called “A Great Day for Hockey”.

Of course, it’s patterned after the words of late Penguins head coach “Badger” Bob Johnson, who passed away from brain cancer in 1991.  Penguins’ president David Morehouse said “there is such a feeling of optimism around Pittsburgh Penguins hockey these days, from our tremendous young talent on the ice, to the phenomenal support of our fans, to the extensive community outreach by our players – and it all adds up to a growing bond between our team and the Pittsburgh region.  Penguins fans know it was the late Badger Bob Johnson who coined the phrase, ‘It’s a Great Day For Hockey,’ but we believe that Badger Bob’s optimism is perfectly applied to Penguins hockey of the 21st century.  With a growing young, tech-savvy fan base and a state-of-the-art arena on the horizon, we believe the Penguins reflect the energy, drive and innovation of the new Pittsburgh.”

The Penguins plan on having the theme around Mellon Arena, as well as video and print advertisements.

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According to reports, the Penguins have signed promising forward Joey Haddad to a three year entry level contract.  He will be reassigned to the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles of the QMJHL. Haddad impressed Penguins management in the recently completed prospects camp and had 31 goals and 62 points last season.

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FSN Pittsburgh announced today that they have increased their High Definition coverage to 64 of this season’s 71 games on that network.

Pens’ GM Ray Shero filled that open spot on the roster by acquiring checking line winger Mike Zigomanis from the Phoenix Coyotes for future considerations.

It’s another good depth acquisition by Shero.  The two main assets that Zigomanis has, and that the Penguins needed, is another right-handed shot and that is very good at faceoffs.  Zigomanis had nearly a 60% faceoff win percentage last season.  He can also kill penalties as well.

UPDATE 11:00AM:

A “BANNER” NIGHT IN PITTSBURGH

It will be a Banner Night in Pittsburgh when the Penguins open their home season Saturday at 7:30 p.m. against the New Jersey Devils at Mellon Arena.

The Penguins will introduce two new banners celebrating their 2007-08 Eastern Conference and Atlantic Division championships, as well as three others commemorating the team’s history of individual achievement.

Two new banners will list the Penguins’ 12 NHL scoring champions, and another will list their five NHL MVP award-winners.

In an effort to standardize the expanding banner collection, the Penguins also have created new banners for each of the team’s previous championships – Stanley Cup, Presidents Trophy, conference and division. They all will be on display at the home opener Saturday night.

“The Penguins have a deep and rich history of success, and we thought this presented a great opportunity to standardize our display of the team’s championship banners,” said team president David Morehouse. “In addition, the banners highlighting the scoring championships and MVP awards are a way for us to celebrate, in a very unique way, the great players who have worn the Penguins’ uniform.

“When Badger Bob Johnson first came to Pittsburgh, he said one of his goals was to have championship banners hanging from the roof of the Arena. We think Badger Bob would be proud of all these banners. It truly will be a great day for hockey.”

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 File this one under the Head Scratching category.

According to the PG, the Penguins will not hold any banner raising ceremony in celebration of their Eastern Conference championship last season.  It’s reported that the banner will be raised in time for Saturday’s home opener versus the Devils.

A few different points of view that I can see on this;

• One would think that this would be a great (but short) ceremony to energize the home fans on the night of the home opener that have been so supportive these past couple of seasons.   I would think 67 straight sellouts confirm that.  With reference to the planning aspect, it’s not like it would be the most elaborate ceremony to set up.  Just dust off the box that the Pens used for Mario’s un-retiring of his number (more on that in a second), turn off the lights, and hoist it up.  Piece of cake !!
• On the other side of the equation, the Pens’ organ-i-zation has a recent history with not holding banner ceremonies.  Mario Lemieux, certainly the picture of humility, declined to have the Penguins hold a re-retiring number ceremony when he hung up his skates for good a couple of years ago.  Now, I have no idea whether Mario had any influence at all on this decision, I’m just saying that this type of thing has happened before with the Pens.
• And finally, there is one other thing that may be the reason:  Save the banner ceremony for when the Stanley Cup Champions banner is raised.  Who knows, maybe that’s it.  I guess that I could support that reasoning.

In addition, also according to the PG, the Penguins also may be standardizing the banners’ appearance, as well as possibly creating new banners for the scoring championships of Mario, Jaromir Jagr and Sidney Crosby.

I have to be honest, I’ve never been a big fan of Taffe. I’ve thought that he is fairly slow and his hands have never been that good. It simply appears that the third and fourth liners that the Penguins have kept are faster and grittier than Taffe.

Also, the Pens have put disgruntled winger Kris Beech on unconditional waivers. This means that if he continues to not report to WBS and he clears waivers, the Pens can terminate his contract is two weeks.

I honestly don’t understand what Beech is attempting to do. He’s bounced around with several clubs in the last few years, it’s painfully obvious that he’s at best a borderline NHL player. Holding out on the Penguins is not going to improve that sentiment.

Lastly, the Penguins have made their Media Guide available online in PDF format. Here is the link.

From the Penguins;

Pens to Host “Trib Total Media Faceoff Festival 2008″ on Mario Lemieux Place

Oct 7, 2008, 2:38 PM EDT

The Pittsburgh Penguins will host the “Trib Total Media Faceoff Festival 2008” on Mario Lemieux Place before the team’s first four home games at Mellon Arena starting on Saturday.  The outdoor festival will offer free admission and will open at 4:00 pm for weekend match-ups (Saturday, Oct. 11 vs. New Jersey and Saturday, Oct. 18 vs. Toronto) and 5:00 pm for weekday games (Tuesday, Oct. 14 vs. Philadelphia and Thursday, Oct. 16 vs. Washington).

The event will feature a 9’ x 12’ LED screen for fans without tickets to watch the games outdoors.  Various food vendors will be open until the start of the third period.  Several youth-oriented activity stations will also be available until the start of each game.  The National Aviary will be on hand with live penguins for the home opener on Oct. 11 from 5-7 pm.

The Penguins flagship radio station, 105.9 The X, will broadcast live from the event on Oct. 11.  FSN Pittsburgh will broadcast Savran on Sportsbeat live from Mario Lemieux Place on Oct. 16.

A limited number of tickets remain for the Oct. 14 and Oct. 16 games.  For more information on tickets or to join the Season Ticket Waiting List, please call 412-642-PENS or 1-800-642-PENS, or log on to www.pittsburghpenguins.com.

For the second straight game to start the season, the Penguins had another poor performance to close out their trip to Sweden with a 3-1 loss to the Ottawa Senators.

The Penguins should feel fortunate that they got the two points in Game #1 on Saturday, because quite frankly if it weren’t for a very shaky Martin Gerber, the Penguins could easily be flying back home staring at 0-2.

The most dangerous component for the Penguins, their powerplay, was putrid once again today.  Going 0 for 7 in yesterday’s game, they sure looked like they were headed for another goose egg in seven attempts in Game #2, but Alex Goligoski put a one-timer past Sens goalie Alex Auld with two seconds remaining in the game to spoil the shutout.

The “it’s still early” remark especially applies when it comes to that powerplay.  It’s becoming clear that the short preseason and travel time has affected the lack of chemistry and flow of both powerplay units.  However, one of the common attributes to these units since the arrival of Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin has been the continued forcing of the extra “pretty” pass.  That was in high gear today, no doubt about it.

Speaking of the powerplay, someone please help me understand something.  I am certainly no hockey expert, not even close, but I just can’t understand why does Coach Mike Yeo continue to put the right-handed Kris Letang on the right point of the powerplay, and have a lefty, which was either Evgeni Malkin or Alex Goligoski, on the left point ??  Is it foolish to think that having those players at those positions eliminates the one-timers from BOTH points ??  The only advantage I can see to doing that is that is makes it easier for those players to keep the puck in the zone on their forehand.  So please, someone, enlighten me.

One might look at the shot totals, which read the Penguins outshooting the Sens 31-27, and think that the Penguins had plenty of scoring opportunities.  Frankly, that was not the case.  A majority of those shots were harmless wrist shots from the perimeter.

The first period was without any scoring, but it had plenty of up-tempo and rough and tumble play.  The physical play on the Penguins’ end was led by both Brooks Oprik and Matt Cooke.  Orpik had two huge hits, one of former Pen Jarkko Ruutu and the other on Sens’ captain Daniel Alfredsson.  Cooke was once again throwing his body around with several hits again today.

The second period saw the Sens get on the scoreboard first after the Penguins got a tough break on a double minor roughing call on new Pen Eric Godard.  Godard was tussling in front of the Sens’ goal with Chris Neil but for some reason Godard got the extra two minutes.  On the ensuing powerplay, Jason Spezza on the goal line fed a cross-goal pass to Dany Heatley, whose initial tap-in attempt was stopped by Marc-Andre Fleury, but Heatley’s second whack got under Fleury’s pads and into the net to make it 1-0 Sens.

It stayed that way until there was about eight minutes left in the game when the Sens, on another powerplay, saw Alfredsson give a nice centering feed in the slot to Heatley, who ripped a bouncing puck on a one-timer that got between Fleury’s body and arm to make it 2-0 Sens.  I’d have to classify that one as a soft goal.

The game was put out of reach a few minutes later when Antoine Vermette, who was on a breakaway, actually fanned on his first attempt, but his momentum carried himself and the puck towards the goal.  By the time Fleury realized where the puck was, Vermette got enough on the puck to tap it into the net to make it 3-0.

And as was mentioned before, the shutout was averted when Goligoski took a centering feed from behind the goal from Crosby for the one-timer to close out the scoring at 3-1.

Overall, I guess the Penguins would regard the trip as a success, although I wouldn’t be sad to not see the Penguins do any more of these for a while.  The Penguins will head home on Monday to try to get their body clocks back to East Coast time before they have their home opener against Marty Brodeur and the Devils on Saturday night.

Because without Tyler Kennedy, they would be staring at a 0-1 record after a pretty dismal performance.

Instead, Kennedy’s two goals, one at the beginning of the game and the other at the very end, gave the Penguins a 4-3 overtime win over the Ottawa Senators.

It certainly was not anything close to an ideal season opener for the Penguins.  The Senators clearly out-hustled and out-hit the Penguins for the vast majority of the game.  The Sens had several big hits, some bordering on dirty, and kept a very aggressive forecheck on the Penguins for most of the game.

Kennedy started the scoring off only 40 seconds into the game when he took a Jordan Staal feed from behind the goal and performed what has become his patented shot, a quick turning wrister from about 15 feet away that deflected off Sens goalie Martin Gerber and into the net to make it 1-0 Penguins.

It stayed that way until about midway through the first period when former Penguins Shean Donovan deflected a Dean McAmmond pass/shot past Marc-Andre Fleury to tie the game at one.

Early in the second period, Evgeni Malkin gave the Penguins the lead once again on the penalty kill.  He got a fortunate bounce after a Sens’ dumping attempt deflected off Chris Neil and right back to Malkin, who skated in on a breakaway, gave Gerber a forehand/backhand move, slid the puck under Gerber’s pads and into the net to make it 2-1 Penguins.

It appeared that we would see the first scrap of the season between Neil, who had just boarded Kris Letang, and new Penguin Eric Godard a couple of minutes after Malkin’s goal.  However, not only did Neil punk out, but Godard got himself a hooking penalty trying to get Neil to drop the gloves.  The Sens capitalized on the ensuing powerplay when a wide-open Dany Heatley got a nice backhanded feed from the endboards from Jason Spezza and promptly fired a wrister to the top shelf to beat Fleury and tie the game at two apiece.

It stayed that way until about two minutes remained in the second period.  The Penguins were on one of their horrendous powerplays when Spezza broke on a 2-on-1 breakaway and scored short-handed on a top shelf wrister to give the Sens their first lead of the game, 3-2.

The only scoring of the third period, fortunately for the Penguins, came from the maybe the most unlikely source.  Rob Scuderi took a centering feed from Sidney Crosby and fired a seemingly harmless wrister towards Gerber.  It was unclear whether the puck deflected off the Sens’ defender who dove to block the shot, or that Gerber simply mishandled the save, but irregardless it deflected off Gerber’s glove and into the net to tie the game at three apiece.

The game went into overtime and appeared that the teams were headed towards a shootout when Spezza’s attempt to skate into the Penguins’ zone was thwarted by Kennedy, who jumped in front of Spezza to steal the puck.  Kennedy then skated into the Sens’ zone, shot a hard wrister through the legs of the Sens’ defender, and past Gerber to give the Penguins the win.

Other notes:

• The powerplay, to put it nicely, stunk.  0 for 7, including one 5-on-3 advantage, and not really one good scoring opportunity.  There was no chemistry or flow at all from either powerplay unit.  I’m not going to overreact after only one game, but obviously the Pens’ powerplay is a major threat when it’s successful.
• As for the new Penguins, Miro Satan and Ruslan Fedotenko were decent, nothing spectacular.  Matt Cooke had some decent offensive threats, but nothing in the agitator category.  Godard wanted to do his job, meaning dropping the gloves with Neil, but was turned down.  Again, it’s only one game.
• With the shorter glass around the boards in Sweden, both teams got one delay of game penalty each.  That’s in addition to the eleven other penalties called throughout the game.
• Fleury was average overall.  The deflection for the first goal was a good shot.  On second glance at Heatley’s goal, it appears that it may have deflected off Malkin and past Fleury.  Fleury may have been going down a bit too soon on Spezza’s goal.
• The game’s three stars were Kennedy, Spezza and Malkin.
• Not the greatest homecoming for Sens’ captain Daniel Alfredsson, who finished at a game-low -3.
• Mats Sundin dropped the ceremonial first puck.  That’s good for another month full of mind-numbing rumors.

The teams will have their rematch at the same time on Sunday.

Forward Janne Pesonen, whom the Penguins signed from the Finnish Elite League this past offseason, has been reassigned to Wilkes-Barre/Scranton.  Pesonen’s reassignment reduces the Penguins’ roster to the allowed limit of 24 for the two game series this weekend versus Ottawa.  John Curry will be the third Pens’ goaltender on the trip, and it’s highly likely that Curry will be reassigned to WBS as well after the Penguins return to the States.

Evgeni Malkin, Tyler Kennedy, Ruslan Fedotenko and Pascal Dupuis scored for the Penguins.  Sidney Crosby had three assists.  Jokerit scored their only goal against Dany Sabourin on a penalty shot.

The methods of watching the game were slim, if at all.  The link I finally got to work looked to be a webcast coming from some Finnish dude’s living room.  Whatever, it worked.

The Penguins will now fly back to Stockholm and prepare for the real thing, the opening of the NHL season against Ottawa Saturday and Sunday nights.

• Petr Sykora (groin) and Max Talbot (leg) were held out.  It’s unknown if either of them will be ready for Saturday’s opener.
• Kris Letang got rave reviews on the left point of the #1 power play unit.  Gee, what a shocker. 
• It sure sounded like Janne Pesonen looked good out there again.  I’ll be surprised if Janne is sent down with that last cut. 
• Brooks Oprik and Evgeni Malkin were named alternate captains for the Penguins.  It’s unknown at this time if those selections are permanent, but unofficial word has it that Orpik’s selection will be permanent and Malkin’s will be a month-long rotating selection.  Orpik is an excellent and natural choice, he’s been building to that status for a few years now, now is the perfect time.  Malkin’s is somewhat surprising to me, but I like it.  It’s already been proven that when Malkin is given a position of leadership and responsibility, such as when Crosby went down last year, that he flourished.  In addition, this should prove to be a big confidence booster for Malkin’s English skills.
• Penguins 2004 draft choice Michal Sersen was traded to the Lightning (who else !!) for a 2009 5th round pick.  Another solid trade for Ray Shero.
• FSN Pittsburgh announced their broadcast for this year’s Penguins.  FSN will have 71 out of the Penguins’ 82 regular season games, including 49 in HD.  The other eleven games will either be on Versus or NBC.