Sidney Crosby
Sidney Crosby
Sidney Patrick Crosby, ONSis a Canadian professional ice hockey player who serves as captain of the Pittsburgh Penguins of the National Hockey League. Crosby was drafted first overall by the Penguins out of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League. During his two-year major junior career with the Rimouski Océanic, he earned back-to-back CHL Player of the Year awards and led his club to the 2005 Memorial Cup final. Nicknamed "The Next One", he was one of the most highly regarded...
NationalityCanadian
ProfessionHockey Player
Date of Birth7 August 1987
CityCole Harbour, Canada
CountryCanada
When a goalie is off for that long, you expect he might be a little rusty. Early on, he was giving out a few more rebounds than normal. If we had jumped on a few on those, it might have been different. As the game wore on, he seemed to get more comfortable and he was pretty solid back there.
You never expect a situation like that so when it comes, you just have to have confidence in each other, and I think that's what was going through our minds. I think we were confident, and we knew we did a good job the last couple games. It was just a matter of doing it for a little bit longer.
They try to keep a close eye on me, they just wanted to play the body and get their hands up a little bit when they're hitting. I expect every game to be physical.
I looked forward to it for a long time. It feels awesome. Yeah, I was happy. It's something you dream of, scoring in the NHL, and you only do it the first time once. It was big. There's a lot of emotion. The fans were great. It was so loud. I never expected to hear them (chanting) my name. You never expect that.
I really didn't expect anything from this season, I came in open-minded and went with the flow. A lot of things happened during the season, good and bad.
I expected the speed and the size of guys to be a little different than junior, and that I'd have to adapt to that. But as the first week's gone by, I think I feel pretty comfortable with that.
It's more frustrating. My expectation probably wasn't that I'd play [during the playoffs], but I was just trying to make sure that if there was any chance that it was possible to come back that I was ready and that I'd done everything I could to be ready. It's frustrating, disappointing. But can't really control any of that.
The first two periods it wasn't there, I don't know why. I was trying to create things but there were so many power plays, it's tough to get a feel for the puck and get your legs under you. But there's no excuses. I have to find a way to be ready. Obviously I didn't have the same jump but I don't expect myself to come in here and get three goals every night. It's not going to be a perfect night every time.
I'm trying to learn as much as I can out there, but I'm confident in what I can do,
I'm just trying to help the team win. That's been my goal all season.
I'm looking at it as short-term as possible. I want to have a good camp and push myself to raise my game as best I can. Obviously, this is a new level, but the pressure has always been there. I've always put a lot of pressure on myself to perform.
It's something that's been talked about a lot, so it's nice to get it and nice to have the weight off the shoulders, too.
It's special, not only for him but my whole family. We pretty much all grew up Montreal fans but, with him being drafted by them, seeing me play in this building against a team that drafted him I'm sure it's a little more special.
It's something you dream about, scoring in the NHL. There's a lot of emotion that comes out of that. But it would have been nice if we had finished it off.