Sidney Crosby is set to meet with a doctor today to determine whether or not he can play in the Penguins’ first playoff game on Wednesday. If he is cleared, the Penguins will be healthy, well healthy enough to play, nobody is really 100 percent at this point of the season. It’s scary good how good they could be when all are healthy and on the ice together. If you remember Crosby got hurt in his first shift of the game against Tampa Bay. That was also Jarome Iginla’s first game in a Penguin uniform, so those two haven’t even had the possibility of playing together.
Hopefully Crosby is cleared and that just add the best player in the world to a roster that is already stacked with stars. When Crosby was hurt he was the points leader in NHL and it only took almost a month for someone to overtake him, and that show just how good he was playing. Even with missing the last month or so of the season there is still a chance he could win the Most Valuable Player Award because that’s how dominant he was. But when he comes back and you have to believe if it’s not this series it will be the next. When he comes back, you can reunite that line that was the best in hockey when Crosby was in the middle. So it would be Crosby, Kunitz, and Dupuis, and who knows you might be able to plug Iginla in there at some point.
Your second line would consist of a guy by the name of Evgeni Malkin, who is arguably the second best player in the world. You could put him between James Neal who just came back from a concussion he received against the Rangers. And on the other side of Malkin would be Iginla who is usually left wing guy but he understands his role and said he would play wherever the team needed him to.
The third line for the Pens could be the second line for most of the other teams in the league. That third line would consist of Brandon Sutter at center, Brendan Morrow at left wing, and Matt Cooke rounding out that line on the right side. Morrow has really picked it up of late, and has been scoring quality goals for the Pens. Sutter is one of the team’s best faceoff guys and fits in well behind Crosby and Malkin.
Finally that fourth line has to consist of Jussi Jokinen, Craig Adams, and either Tanner Glass or Tyler Kennedy. Jokinen has performed well above expectations for the Penguins, Adams is a big factor on the penalty kill and they can’t take him out of the lineup, and Glass or Kennedy would add some needed grit to the line. Glass would be a better fore-checker and plays quality penalty kill minutes, but Kennedy adds a little bit of a scoring touch to that line so it should be interesting to see who plays.
On defense you get your shutdown pair of Brooks Orpik and Paul Martin back together, then you could put Kris Letang with Douglas Murray, and the last pair would most likely be Matt Niskanen and Mark Eaton. Those are three solid pairings, and not to mention the fact that Deryk Engelland and Simon Despres are on the bench.
A healthy Pittsburgh Penguin team is something to feared throughout the NHL. There is star power on every line it seems like. They have one of the deepest defenses in the league, and have two of the best players in the world on offense. Coming into the playoffs they have to be considered the favorite to come out of the east and win the Stanley Cup.
Photo Credits: Getty Images
