Pens on fast track to success

Pittsburgh sailed through the Eastern playoffs with only two losses in 14 games.

PITTSBURGH (AP) — Everybody in the NHL knew these Pittsburgh Penguins would be very good, and soon. How could a team with players as young and talented as Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Marc-Andre Fleury and Jordan Staal not be?

This good, this soon? This dominating, and this determined to succeed? Hardly.

The Penguins didn’t listen to all that speculation that a team built around so much youth needed another year or two to mature, gain experience and become wise with the ways of the NHL playoff world.

With a growth spurt like this, the rest of the NHL must be wondering if they can keep up.

The Penguins, whose core players barely average 21 years of age, blew through the Eastern Conference playoffs with only two losses in 14 games. Just as impressively, 10 of the 12 wins were by more than one , even though most of these Penguins had previously won only one playoff game during their NHL careers.

Twelve playoff victories in a little more than a month’s time. Two years ago, the Penguins won only 22 games during Crosby’s rookie season.

“I don’t think we had any expectations as far as I was concerned,” said Crosby, the youngest captain in NHL history at age 20 when the season began. “I think we did everything in our control as players to have the right attitude and learn as much as we could, as quick as we could. We’re lucky to have a mix of guys, with veterans and younger guys, that have really shown they can play, even early on in their careers.”

The Penguins never let up after quickly opening a 2-0 lead in decisive Game 5 of the conference finals against Philadelphia Sunday, winning 6-0 to secure the franchise’s first trip to the Stanley Cup finals since 1992.

“I think coming in here [in 2005], I was just so focused on trying to have a good first year, let alone [thinking about] going to the Cup finals this quickly, with the amount of youth we’ve had,” Crosby said.

The Penguins, as young, fast and talented as they are, may need to win this season for this group to be remembered as champions, as the salary cap likely will prevent them from keeping their current roster together.

With Malkin and Fleury soon due new contracts, and Malkin will want megamillions, the Penguins may not be able to re-sign free agent forwards Marian Hossa and Ryan Malone. Between them, Hossa (nine goals) and Malone (six goals) have been integral parts of the Penguins’ Cup run.

Not that coach Michel Therrien, whose structured and demanding system forces every player to play both ways, is thinking of that. To him, there’s still too much to be done, still so much to be won.

“I’m not a big fan of looking at the top of the mountain when there’s a lot of steps to be made,” Therrien said. “And the next one, it’s another step.”