Penguins make their cuts….
The Pittsburgh Penguins announced today that they have reduced their roster to 22 players for the start of the NHL season, with a bit of a shake-up on what was originally expected.
The Penguins sent all of Mike Weaver, Kristopher Letang, Ryan Stone, Jonathan Filewich, and late recall Jeff Taffe to their AHL club, the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins. They also announced the signing of Adam Hall to a one-year two-way contract, officially ending the tryout with the club.
The 22 player roster for opening night is as follows:
Forwards:
Sidney Crosby (C)
Mark Recchi (A)
Evgeni Malkin
Colby Armstrong
Erik Christensen
Georges Laraque
Ryan Malone
Gary Roberts
Jarkko Ruutu
Jordan Staal
Petr Sykora
Maxime Talbot
Adam Hall
Defensemen:
Sergei Gonchar (A)
Mark Eaton
Brooks Orpik
Rob Scuderi
Darryl Sydor
Ryan Whitney
Alain Nasreddine
Goaltenders:
Marc-André Fleury
Dany Sabourin
Therrien has been unhappy with his defense, and scratching Letang and replacing Sydor from the top pairing on the last pre-season game against Buffalo apparently had the writing on the wall. In that game the defensive pairings were Gonchar/Eaton, Whitney/Orpki, Sydor/Scuderi