Penguins/NHL
Goaltender Marc Andre Fleury, and defensemen Phillipe Boucher, Ryan Whitney did not practice today. Fleury has been skating on his own and was in the building working out. Still no official word on Boucher.
The coaching staff made some minor line changes.
Talbot – Crosby – Satan
Fedotenko – Malkin – Sykora
Cooke – Staal – Kennedy
Dupuis – Zigomanis – Godard
* Fedotenko has moved from the 4th to the 2nd line. Pascal Dupuis a healthy scratch on Saturday is skating with the 4th line.
In practice the Penguins started out with some flow drills. A lot of skating in these drills and the coaching staff had the players moving at all times.
They did about 13-15 minutes of 1-on-1’s and 2-on-1’s. For the most part the defensemen owned the one-on-one drill. Ruslan Fedotenko scored a beautiful breakaway goal. He was skated very well and had a good practice. Max Talbot blew by Mark Eaton on one ocassion. Eaton was paired with Alex Goligoski in practice. The D-Pairs remain the same as they were on Saturday.
The final part of practice the Penguins worked on D-zone coverage and breakouts. (5-on-5 down low). A very good uptempo drill and then the team worked on neutral zone breakouts for about 10 minutes.
Malkin named second star in month of November:Malkin ranked second among NHL scorers with 23 points (seven goals, 16 assists) in 12 games, moving into the League scoring lead and helping the Penguins post a 9-2-1 record. Malkin recorded assists in the first six games of the month, extending his consecutive-game assist streak to 13 — the longest in the NHL since Pittsburgh’s Jaromir Jagr had assists in 16 consecutive games in January/February 2001. Malkin registered a pair of four-point games, notching a goal and three assists in 5-2 victory over Buffalo Nov. 15 and tallying his third career hat trick and an assist in a 5-3 win over the New York Islanders Nov. 26. Malkin (10-29–39) and Penguins teammate Sidney Crosby (13-21–34) rank 1-2 in League scoring.
Sidney Crosby named first star of the week: — Pittsburgh Penguins center Sidney Crosby, Anaheim Ducks goaltender Jonas Hiller and St. Louis Blues goaltender Chris Mason have been named the NHL’s ‘Three Stars’ for the week ending Sunday, Nov. 30.
FIRST STAR — SIDNEY CROSBY, C, PITTSBURGH PENGUINS
Crosby led all NHL scorers for the week by tallying nine points (six goals, three assists) in three games as the Penguins (14-6-3, 31 points) went 2-1-0 and remained fourth in the Eastern Conference. Crosby tallied multiple points in all three games, beginning with a goal and two assists in a 5-3 victory over the New York Islanders Nov. 26. He notched two goals in a 4-3 loss to the Buffalo Sabres Nov. 28 and finished the week by tallying his second career hat trick and one assist in a 4-1 victory over the New Jersey Devils Nov. 29. Crosby climbed to second in overall NHL scoring with 34 points (13 goals, 21 assists), trailing teammate Evgeni Malkin (10-29–39).
Penguins fans set records in toy drive: Pittsburgh Penguins fans set new records by donating 3,368 toys and almost $11,000 in cash to purchase toys for children in need during the team’s annual holiday toy drive. The toys are donated to the U.S. Marines “Toys for Tots” program for distribution to children from underprivileged families in the Pittsburgh area. The Penguins and the Marines collected toys and cash at the Saturday, Nov. 22 game vs. Vancouver and the Saturday, Nov. 29 game vs. New Jersey at Mellon Arena. At the New Jersey game alone, fans donated 1,859 toys and more than $5,800 in cash to purchase toys.
