Pens clear out arena lockers for last time

Associated Press

PITTSBURGH, pa.

A road jersey was hung neatly in every locker stall. Brand new sticks and a fully loaded travel bag also were ready for each player when the Pittsburgh Penguins arrived at Mellon Arena.

It’s a normal mid-May scene for a team that’s appeared in 10 playoff series in three seasons. There was only one difference: The Penguins were packing for the summer, rather than for the next round of the playoffs.

The neatly bound books at each locker? Not a scouting report for the Eastern Conference finals, but a guide to offseason conditioning.

That’s what made saying goodbye unusually difficult, even for the Penguins players who will return next season. For most, it was one last visit Friday to their Mellon Arena dressing room before they relocate across the street to the Consol Energy Center next season.

“It’s weird to be done now, already,” goalie Marc-Andre Fleury said. “It’s tough.”

Already missing is Mario Lemieux’s locker nameplate, which remained above his empty stall even after he retired during the 2005-06 season. Some players, including Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Jordan Staal and Fleury, don’t know another NHL home locker room.

“It’s kind of mixed emotions, but certainly all the firsts I’ve have in the NHL, I tie in with Mellon,” Crosby said. “There’s a part of me that will be sad but, at the same time, I’m looking forward to the new rink as well.”

For now, putting this season and the seven-game loss to Montreal in the Eastern Conference semifinals behind them will take a little longer. The Penguins no longer are the Stanley Cup champions, they’re former champions.

They appeared to have a clear path to the conference finals after Washington, New Jersey and Buffalo lost in the opening round, but they were tripped up by the same overachieving team that eliminated the top-seeded Capitals in the first round.

No, getting over a loss like this takes more than two days.

Malkin dismissed his own season as “bad,” although his drop-off from 113 points in 2008-09 to 77 points partly resulted from him missing 15 games to injury or illness.

“Next year I’m going to be better, of course,” Malkin said. “This year is not good for me.”