This weekend was the kick-off of the NHL season! The NHL decided to start the season overseas in Prague and Stockholm to bring more attention to the NHL. It seemed like a cool experience for the players and good exposure for the NHL, but I’m really not a big fan of it. For one the time change is hard for the players to adjust to and the condition of the rinks are different (glass is lower, ice is smaller, etc.). But, hey there is nothing to I can do about it, and it was a great weekend of hockey so I can’t complain.

Let’s start with the first match up, the Rangers and Lightning. A lot of people including myself call the Lightning Pittsburgh south because in the off season they picked up Ryan Malone, Adam Hall, and Gary Roberts, who were all on our team last year. Well those players really are not making an impact on that team and Ryan Malone is way overpaid. The Lightning lost both games and were out-shot almost 2 to 1 both games. The Rangers are looking like a good team this year, their pickup of Naslund is the off season is looking good.

Now onto the Pens, the Senators are always a hard team to play, we always seem to have trouble with them. Over the past few years a real rivalry has started too. The Penguins took game 1 with 2 goals from Tyler Kennedy. He is really looking good so far this season! The Senators took the second game with a 3-1 final score. The Pens really looked bad in this game! Their powerplay was horrible in both games. One of the main reasons for this is because Sergei Gonchar is out for at least 4 months. He was basically like our quarterback for the power play. The Pens just look lost out there without him. They really need to work on their powerplay to be successful this year. A lot of the pens new players are looking good, it was great to see Matt Cooke set up and be an enforcer on the team.

It is going to be an interesting year for the Pens for sure. Over the summer I had wanted to start a Penguins blog, I have the domain ready and everything, but with all the work over at ThinkComputers I’ve had limited time to work on it. If anyone wants to help out shoot me an e-mail.