March 18
Pittsburgh Tribune Review
columnist Rob Rossi
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I'm a huge fan of "Cheers," for my money the best ensemble sitcom in television history. It also has one of the iconic theme songs of any television program. I particularly like these lines: You want to go where people know/people are all the same/You want to go/where everybody knows your name Well, everybody in Boston, the setting for fictional "Cheers," knows the name of Penguins LW MATT COOKE. Though, as you can see from these Boston newspaper articles, he's probably most known in this city as "bum" or "rat" or… uh, just take a look: Well, never let it be said that Boston's media lacks for keeping water at a boil. Good on them. Hey, it takes a lot to knock the Red Sox off the perch in ..."
March 16
Dallas Morning News
columnist Jean-Jacques Taylor
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We all know the Stars, currently 12th in the Western Conference, aren't going to make the playoffs. We all know Marty Turco, a free agent at the end of the season, isn't going to return next season. That means it's time to look toward the future. These days, the 26-year-old Lehtonen is the future. Now, that doesn't mean he can't play himself out of being the No. 1 goalie next season, but the Stars should certainly use the end of this season to figure it out. Lehtonen should play as much as possible during the season's final month. It's not going to make Turco happy, and it's probably not going to make players such as Brenden Morrow, Brad Richards and Steve Ott, who will refuse to raise ..."
March 14
Pittsburgh Tribune Review
columnist Rob Rossi
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On the second day of high school football practice during my sophomore year, a senior linebacker busted through a gap on a dummy-team offensive line and crushed a fairly clueless fullback with force. I was that fullback. A few plays later I alerted a coach to the blurred vision and was removed from practice. After a night in the hospital for observation I was diagnosed with post-concussion syndrome, and I didn't play for another 10 weeks. Four months after football season ended a blade-hockey defenseman was lightly bumped while retrieving the ball in the defensive zone. Teammates said the following few shifts showed that defenseman skating with a slower stride, his reaction to plays a few ..."
March 12
Detroit Free Press
columnist Michael Rosenberg
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"Both of those guys, in my opinion, are the best two-way players in the world." -- Red Wings general manager Ken Holland, speaking about Henrik Zetterberg and Pavel Datsyuk, June 5, 2008 That comment has stuck with me, for a few reasons. One is that Holland said it on the ice in Pittsburgh after the Red Wings had won the Stanley Cup. He said it even though Pittsburgh had two more touted young stars, Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin. Holland is not prone to overstatement, and certainly not to gloating, yet he said it on Crosby and Malkin's home ice. And mostly, I remember it because it did not seem like an opinion. It seemed like a statement of extraordinary fact. Zetterberg and Datsyuk had ..."
March 12
Detroit Free Press
columnist Michael Rosenberg
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This was the kind of boring, predictable, easy victory that we've seen 1,000 times from the Red Wings over the years. Except that it wasn't boring. And it wasn't predictable. And it wasn't as easy as it used to be. And it probably won't be easy again all year. The final was Wings 5, Minnesota Wild 1, and you can try to break down what it means, or you can just decide that is what it means: They needed to win and they did. The Wings have never doubted their talent, and they shouldn't. The team they are putting on the ice now is good enough to make the playoffs. Johan Franzen scored two goals, Henrik Zetterberg scored and was a force for most of the game, and Drew Miller scored a goal off ..."
March 9
Toronto Star
columnist Chris Zelkovich
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Sidney Crosby and Paul Henderson have something more in common than the fact they both rewrote Canadian hockey history. Neither knows the whereabouts of all of the equipment they wore or used while scoring their historic goals. The stick Crosby was holding when he scored the overtime goal that gave Canada the gold medal at the Vancouver Olympics is missing, along with one of his gloves, apparently scooped up by someone hoping to cash in big time on their historical value. A $10,000 reward has been offered for their return, no questions asked."