Penguins and Panthers will renew acquaintances today after their entertaining battle from Saturday night.
The Panthers are scratching two veteran players that have had their names associated with trade talks. The reason they have been in trade rumors is because the Panthers are content with letting the younger players play
The Penguins will again lean on their young defense corp. to feed the forwards in their quest to gain speed through the neutral zone. The Penguins did not have a banner night in the possession department on Saturday. It will be an area that they need to clean up a little bit.
Mario will probably never get over the 1996 Eastern Conference Finals where an unskilled Florida Panthers team clutched and grabbed their way to the Stanley Cup Final while throwing rats at them. He has his troll game working today
The @penguins are in for another tough game with the @FlaPanthers tonight! Will Downie have a big game? #letsgopens
— Mario Lemieux (@MarioLemieuxFdn) December 22, 2014
But he may have spoke too soon:
All expected #Pens players are at morning skate with the exception of Sutter and Downie.
— Pittsburgh Penguins (@penguins) December 22, 2014
Some interesting theories are being batted around about Downie's absence:
Mildly concerned that Downie got to South Florida and decided he would take over for Dexter.
— Meesh (@HockeyMeesh) December 22, 2014
But the correct answer is:
Downie, Sutter and Greiss are returning to Pittsburgh to be tested for mumps, Penguins announce.
— Dave Molinari (@MolinariPG) December 22, 2014
However, mumps is being ruled out as a contributing factor in Downie going nuts on Saturday night.
Another day in Penguins hockey, another round of weird sickness and players missing. Old hat.
It is holiday season and that means the World Junior Championship is around the corner. I very much enjoy this tournament because it has the best players in the world at that particular age group and a lot of them are very fun to watch.
That being said I think it is also one of the most overrated tournaments out there. The stock people put into a small two week sample size is so irresponsible. Just be careful about forming silly narratives based on such a small sample of games. You see this more with the Canadian team than any of the other countries because Canada is the only one that treats this tournament as life or death.
As a Penguins fan sit back and enjoy Kasperi Kapanen who will be playing for Finland. If he has a great tournament, great. If he has a bad tournament, so what. He is going to make a few really nice plays and flash some of the skill that he has and that is all you need to take away from it.
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