CRANBERRY TOWNSHIP, Pa. -- Sidney Crosby showed Antti Niemi the backhand, but that's all it was.
A show.
Our generation's greatest hockey player didn't climb to his current heights through games. He did it through practices. He did it by focusing on each drill as if he were some babyfaced rookie sporting some No. 47 sweater and sitting silently on a stool in the kiddie room.
And on this drill, Tuesday at the Lemieux Sports Complex, he slashed across the low slot, turned the puck over to maybe the most feared backhand in NHL history ... and he held it ... and he held it ... and he held it ... and he did so with the blade angled in such a fashion that his release was sure to go top shelf.
Niemi, to his credit, read it correctly. If only it were anyone else.
Because in the millisecond it took for Niemi to raise that big glove hand, Crosby's blade, still angled upward, simply flipped the puck, ever so softly, a little lower between the glove and outstretched pad. And it rainbowed gently across the goal line.
Evil.
Not just the move, but the devilish grin as he glanced back over his shoulder at Niemi when skating away.
But hey, let's talk about how Pittsburgh's proud hockey franchise, which invested eight hard months into one Stanley Cup championship in 2015-16, then another eight hard months into a second consecutive championship in 2016-17, couldn't possibly pull it off again in the next eight months.
Let's talk about how they'll lack the focus. Or the energy. Or the motivation. Or, how they lost a quarter of the roster, all over age 30 -- plus their experience.
Let's talk about how there's just no way.
Either that, or let's talk to Phil Kessel.
"You know, we did it once, and then we did it again," Phil was telling me in that distinctive nonchalance. "I mean, why not?"
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Those next eight months begin, with a rush and a push, at 8:08 p.m. Wednesday at PPG Paints Arena against the Blues. A banner-raising will precede the faceoff, of course, one that Mike Sullivan apparently intends to use, symbolically and otherwise, to assign closure to all that came before.
"I do think we have the ability to draw on our prior experience. We’re in a similar situation," Sullivan was saying Tuesday after practice, characteristically never fully dismissing the effect of one Cup run on the next. "But I think the most important takeaway -- and this is what we’ve been preaching to our players from Day 1 of training camp -- is that we have to be forward-thinking. This is a whole new challenge. We’re a new team. We’ve got to go out and earn it all over again. It starts with Game 1. We can’t get ahead of ourselves. We've got to stay right in the moment. And we’ve got a lot of experience, a mature group, and I think they understand the importance of staying in the moment and staying on task.”
For sure, he's got his players reprising the theme.
"End of a chapter," Carl Hagelin said.
"Turn the page," Carter Rowney said.
"Move forward," Matt Murray said.
The captain carried the torch, too, when I brought it up.
"I think you do feed off what's happened, you build off it, but this really is a different team," " Crosby told me, also after practice. "What we did last year was hard. And I think this could be harder. This is going to be a real challenge. A different kind of challenge, I think."
Oh, it's different, all right. These Penguins, the first to claim consecutive Cups since the Red Wings in 1997 and 1998, are about to pursue the NHL's first three-peat since the Mike Bossy/Bryan Trottier Islanders won four in a row in 1980-83. And in the process, they'll also be trying to exorcise the David Volek demons of 1993, when their only other chance at a three-peat was blown by the very best collection of talent in the franchise's 51-year history:
Yeah, sorry. I know that still stings for some. I remember it, too. Exactly where I was sitting. Exactly where my jaw hit the floor.
Take another hard look and grasp more fully why Sullivan, Crosby and all concerned are cleaning the slate. This team needs freshness, on and off the ice.
Jim Rutherford's roster is already fresher than on the night of June 11 in Nashville, having lost Matt Cullen, Nick Bonino, Chris Kunitz, Ron Hainsey and Trevor Daley, and it could get that much fresher once top prospects Daniel Sprong and Zach Aston-Reese are ready.
Ryan Reaves' addition also will be a plus, no matter how many people on the outside misidentify him as some old-school enforcer. The dude is huge, he can fly on the forecheck, he hits with bad intentions, and his toughness is immensely appreciated by both Crosby and Evgeni Malkin, and the latter on that list should be the only metric anyone needs to evaluate his impact in a league where superstars are treated like diseased cattle.
Add to that Reaves' boisterous, infectious personality, and he'll embody freshness.
"I'm excited for this challenge," the big man told me. "These guys ... I don't know what it is, but you can feel that energy around them."
Jake Guentzel's got energy to spare at age 22, and the skill to match.
Did you know that, between the NHL and AHL regular seasons, then the Stanley Cup playoffs, he scored a total of 50 goals?
Well, this will be his first full NHL season, and he's opening it with a near-etching that he'll be Crosby's linemate for the long haul. And if camp or preseason offered any meaningful signs, that'll stick in the best possible way.
He's got that hunger, too.
"I don't feel like I've proved anything," the kid told me. "Everything that happened last year was awesome, especially the playoffs, but I've got a full season ahead of me. I've got to earn everything."
Kris Letang's spent way too much time conserving energy.
One of the game's great defensemen is back, and he's got this really cool chip he's lugging on his shoulder through all those extra drills that he and extra-drill partner Olli Maatta were out there doing again Tuesday. He seems almost ... mad?
"I'm ready," he told me when asked about the consistent mood. "That's all it is. I'm ready to start playing again. This is what I do."
Add to that a camaraderie, a chemistry that fairly courses through this group's collective veins. Unless anyone's got a better explanation for whatever Tom Kuhnhackl and Guentzel were doing after practice Tuesday:
All of that's a positive. But the challenge, as Crosby stressed, is different. It comes with unknowns.
Who, for example, is going to kill penalties?
This is my No. 1 worry with a bullet. Cullen and Bonino are gone, and they haven't been replaced at all as penalty-killing centermen. Not in any regard. Greg McKegg had an inspired camp, but he isn't worth a fraction of either guy he'll replace. Carter Rowney was wonderful in the playoffs, especially against Ottawa, but his pedigree isn't a match, and he's more of a winger.
The return of Letang, who is as efficient as he is belligerent on the PK, will be a boon. But it's a big overall unknown, as Brian Dumoulin basically acknowledged in our talk Tuesday:
You heard the man. They aren't changing strategy, even if one might suggest that Sullivan and Jacques Martin could make better use of the faster guys up front with a more aggressive approach, similar to what the Flyers have done for years. (Not that they set any standards, for crying out loud. Just referring to their PK method as a possible fit.)
If the Penguins stink it up short-handed, that'll undo a whole lot. But if they're even a little bit better than last season -- 20th with a 79.8 percent kill rate -- that could at least offer a life raft until Rutherford upgrades at center.
Here's another worry: Who will mind the net?
No, I'm not referring to Murray, of course. Just the whole arrangement that's got Murray finally flying solo for the first time without a Marc-Andre Fleury parachute, as well as a 34-year-old Niemi seeking a rebound from the most dismal season of his career in Dallas, and an untested prospect in Tristan Jarry in Wilkes-Barre.
Niemi's grown on me during camp, particularly his play down low and the 'compete level' for which he's drawn heavy praise from Sullivan and his teammates. But the Penguins are stuck with those league-high 19 sets of back-to-back games, so he'll need to be more than the guy who opens and closes the bench gate. He'll need to be largely successful over a quarter of the schedule.
Murray's got to handle that schedule, too. For all that he's already achieved -- to put it bleeping mildly -- he's never logged more games in a single regular season than 53, and that was back with the Soo Greyhounds in the OHL. In three full professional seasons between Wilkes-Barre and Pittsburgh, those totals have been 40, 44 and 49.
I asked Murray what, if anything, he might do to adjust or pace himself, and his answer was just priceless:
So, uh, yeah. The man-child who's won two Cups before he's had a chance to stand on the ice for an opener ... he's one of the worries.
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Quoth Phil: "Why not?"
Elaborate-eth Phil: "I mean, we've got some really good players, right?"
Right. So I took the original Kessel query to a couple others.
"Ummmm ... well, there’s no reason why we couldn’t," Justin Schultz eventually came back. "I don’t know, but we want to get back there. We don’t want anyone else lifting it up. We want to keep it. And we do believe we can do it again this year. All you need is belief, and we've got guys in this room who can get the job done. If you have those two things, anything can happen.”
"It's possible. Of course it's possible," Dumoulin chimed in from a couple stalls down. "I mean, obviously, that’s the end-all, be-all. That’s the goal that we want."
Sounded like there was a 'but' coming, and there was.
"But I think last year we had a good recipe where we kind of took it game by game even though there was a lot of noise about whether we could do it again or not. We focused on winning our next game. That was it. We put ourselves in the best position to possibly do it again. And that’s what we’re focusing on now."
The gold-medal response came from the usual source.
"Phil said, 'Why not?' " Malkin asked me back. "I say I'm ready. Are you ready? If you're ready, I'm ready. Let's go!"
MATT SUNDAY GALLERY
WHAT'S BREWING
• When you've got the real Benstonium -- a.k.a. our new multimedia man, Chris Benson -- on the payroll, you might as well ask him to contribute viral video content to the Random Fun Thing. And so he will, each Wednesday, beginning today with, uh, Kessel eating hot dogs as Pac-Man.
• Already heard from a potential major sponsor for Pitt coverage. It's not done, but it would be a superb start. A reminder: We're seeking sponsorships for both Pitt and Penn State, neither of which currently have one. Email me directly: DK@DKPittsburghSports.com
• The Penguins' quest for a three-peat begins against the Blues at PPG Paints Arena tonight. Katie Brown, Matt Gajtka, Sara Civian, Matt Sunday, and I will have your coverage all day. Well, why not?
PENGUINS
• Event: Game vs. Blues
• Location: PPG Paints Arena
• Time: 8:08 p.m.
• Morning skate: 10:30 a.m.-noon
• Banner ceremony: 7:45 p.m.
• Doors open: 7 p.m.
• Lots open: 6 p.m.
• Our coverage: Brown, DK, Gajtka, Civian, Sunday
STEELERS
• Event: Practice
• Location: Rooney Sports Complex
• Time: 1:15-3:15 p.m.
• Early media availability: 9:30-10 a.m.
• Our coverage: Mark Kaboly
PITT
• Event: Practice
• Location: Rooney Sports Complex
• Time: 9-11 a.m.
• Open to fans: No
• Our coverage: Lance Lysowski
PENN STATE
• Event: Practice
• Location: University Park, Pa.
• Time: 3-6 p.m.
• Open to fans: No
• Our coverage: Snyder
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