Saturday, October 25, 2003
Pittsburgh plays Carolina, a team he has had much success against.
PITTSBURGH (AP) -- Earlier in his career, Mario Lemieux could take the ice and expect to score at least two points.
In 883 career games, he's done it 491 times, including once this season.
Now, in this defensive-minded, system-oriented version of the National Hockey League, multi-point games are much harder to come by.
"It's tough to get points out there," Lemieux said Tuesday.
"If you go out and get a point a game, it's big now."
Lemieux, the Pittsburgh Penguins (1-2-1) all-time leading scorer, needs four points tonight against the Carolina Hurricanes to become the sixth player in NHL history to record 1,700 in his career.
He would join Wayne Gretzky (2,857), Gordie Howe (1,850), Mark Messier (1,846), Marcel Dionne (1,771) and Ron Francis (1,758) on the list.
Proximity
"Once you get close, within a couple points or a couple goals, you start thinking about it a lot more," Lemieux said. "To be able to get to 1,700 points, not too many guys have done it in the past and that's why it's special. You look at the guys who are up there, they're very special players."
That fact has not been lost on his current teammates. One of the players, rookie goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury, wasn't even born when Lemieux scored a goal on his first shot on his first shift in his Oct. 11, 1984, debut against Boston.
An even more amazing statistic is that the entire Penguins team, including Matt Murley (who on Monday was sent to Wilkes-Barre/Scranton) and injured reserve resident Steve McKenna, have combined for 2,105 career points, only 409 more than Lemieux himself.
"I can't even imagine it," Penguins right wing Aleksey Morozov said. "It's unbelievable that he's going to get 1,700 points because players like me are never going to do it."
Had been retired
Lemieux stands to accomplish the feat after 42 months of retirement, a hiatus in 1994-95 to rest after missing 60 games the season before with recurring back problems and undergoing treatments for Hodgkins disease during the 1992-93 campaign.
Also, his creaky back forced him out of 21 games in 1989-90 and the first 50 contests of the following season.
"If you really look at it and dissect it, with everything that Mario's gone through, and possibly where the numbers would be if he played all those games," Penguins coach Eddie Olczyk said.
"He's the best player in the world and, certainly, one of the greatest to ever play the game."
If his career numbers are any indication, there is a good chance Lemieux could at least get halfway there against the Hurricanes. In 37 career games against the Hartford-Carolina franchise, he has netted 30 goals and 72 points.
Even if Lemieux doesn't reach the milestone Wednesday, he'll still have a home game Friday against New Jersey to accomplish the feat at Mellon Arena.
"It's going to be a lot of fun to be here for that," Olczyk said. "Very rarely do you get to work with and play with one of the best ever and it's exciting for everybody."