{"id":440538,"date":"2026-02-01T22:36:55","date_gmt":"2026-02-01T22:36:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/440538\/"},"modified":"2026-02-01T22:36:55","modified_gmt":"2026-02-01T22:36:55","slug":"sidney-crosby-opens-up-on-emotional-pre-game-stanley-cup-tribute-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/440538\/","title":{"rendered":"Sidney Crosby Opens Up on Emotional Pre-Game Stanley Cup Tribute"},"content":{"rendered":"

Saturday afternoon was a special day for Sidney Crosby<\/a> and the Pittsburgh Penguins. Not only did they beat the rival New York Rangers 6\u20135 on home ice, but they did so in front of a large portion of the 2016 Stanley Cup championship team, which was honored before the game to mark the 10-year anniversary of the accomplishment.<\/p>\n

Crosby, Evgeni Malkin<\/a>, Kris Letang<\/a>, and Bryan Rust<\/a> are the only four active players still with the Penguins from that championship squad, and when they stood alongside their former teammates and staff, it was the captain who became emotional \u2014 seen tearing up<\/a> when the camera panned to him during the tribute video.<\/p>\n

To no surprise, he was asked about the ceremony and moment during his postgame media availability, where he opened up on all of the emotions of seeing the video and everyone back in town for the celebration.<\/p>\n

Crosby said<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah, I mean, just a lot of love for these guys. I think seeing some of these clips, you forget \u2014 you know, you\u2019ve played years after that \u2014 you forget some of those moments. I think they just bring back a lot of great memories, and it\u2019s just awesome to see. A lot of emotions, but at the same time, just great memories.<\/p>\n

I love that group. I loved playing, I love the experiences and the memories I\u2019ve had, so yeah, that\u2019s how it comes out. You don\u2019t see those moments all the time, so when you see them, they tend to hit you a little hard the older you get,\u201d<\/p>\n

The 38-year-old is putting together another tremendous season, having produced 58 points (27 goals, 31 assists) through 53 games thus far.<\/p>\n

Sidney Crosby Needs to Get Back Into the Playoffs<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the reason many around the hockey world have been urging Crosby to leave Pittsburgh<\/a> in recent years: to see him back in the postseason.<\/p>\n

\"CrosbyCrosby emotional Penguins<\/p>\n

There\u2019s no player in the NHL more synonymous with dominating the Stanley Cup Playoffs over the last 20 years than Crosby, and given that his game hasn\u2019t slipped at all, it would simply feel wrong to see him go out without getting another taste of it.<\/p>\n

Pittsburgh\u2019s surprising climb to second place in the Metropolitan Division has made a return more and more possible, and the fact that he could have the opportunity to do it alongside Malkin and Letang \u2014 as a Penguin \u2014 feels fitting.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s still a long way to go for that to happen, but the Penguins haven\u2019t been in this strong a position in February in quite some time. So at the very least, Crosby and company have put themselves in a favorable spot to bring playoff hockey back to the Steel City for the first time since 2021-22.<\/p>\n

Next:\u00a0Could the Penguins Take a Flyer on Patrik Laine for a Playoff Push?<\/a><\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Saturday afternoon was a special day for Sidney Crosby and the Pittsburgh Penguins. Not only did they beat…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":440539,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[463,464],"tags":[1495,5,1499,4,60,768,14,104,718,2175],"class_list":{"0":"post-440538","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl-playoffs","8":"category-stanley-cup-playoffs","9":"tag-evgeni-malkin","10":"tag-hockey","11":"tag-kris-letang","12":"tag-nhl","13":"tag-nhl-playoffs","14":"tag-sidney-crosby","15":"tag-stanley-cup","16":"tag-stanley-cup-playoffs","17":"tag-stanley-cup-playoffs-nhl","18":"tag-top-story"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/115997773556381440","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/440538","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=440538"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/440538\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/440539"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=440538"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=440538"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=440538"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}