A Declaration of War...

"So pick your friends out
I'll take my place and you'll take yours
Load your guns up...
Cause now I'm ready for your war..."
Hadouken!: "Declaration of War"

For the latest from the EIHL, have a gander at the post below this one (Arrivals and Departures)...this one is all NHL.

As for the somewhat antagonistic lyrics opening...don't worry, I'm not going all Dubya on you...let me explain...

You may have noticed, or at least formed the opinion, that I'm something of a Pittsburgh Penguins fan. This, in recent hockey terms, was the equivalent of being a six-stone-weakling in a maximum-security prison for the first year or two of my hockey-watching life, right up to the point where one of the greatest talents ever to strap on a pair of skates fell into the Steel City's lap, thanks to a bit of luck in the 2004 and 2005 entry drafts...the seasons were grim but with first Evgeni Malkin and then Sidney Crosby arriving, things have got better and better...and us Pens fans have enjoyed every minute of it (and if you don't know who Crosby and Malkin are, then let me show you)...

Evgeni Malkin...

Sidney Crosby

Anyway...this presents me with something of a quandary, as my good friends Matt and Becky, over at Five Minute Major, are (and don't hold this against them) fans of the Detroit Red Wings, who beat the Pens to the Stanley Cup last year, and are the only obstacle in the way of my team's charge to the Cup again this year, with the finals starting this Saturday, May 30th.

Well, at least Matt is. Becky is first and foremost an Edmonton fan, and thus is well-prepared for being the experience of being on the losing side in a 21st-century Stanley Cup Final...to Carolina, no less...although given the history of the Oilers, not too-well prepared...

And so, naturally, war has been declared-in true hockey tradition, the Breakaway and Five Minute Major, while being good friends away from the ice, will now engage in verbal combat throughout the Stanley Cup Finals, with Matt and Becky cheering for the Red Wings, and me advancing the cause of the Pens. There will be taunting, there will be jokes, there will be below-the-belt pop-culture references, and at the end, one blog will earn the right to claim their team are the better...

And naturally, you lot out there can follow every sledge, every dig and every obscure joke for your own entertainment...

And it starts now...the gloves, from this point, are off...I shall preface every post relating to the duel with an appropriate catchy title, as soon as I or FMJ (or even you lot out there) think of it, but for now...let's consider just why the Pens will emerge victorious...

"Heads I win, tails you lose
out of my way I'm coming through
roll the dice don't think twice...
and we crush...crush 'em"
Megadeth: "Crush 'Em"

Chris Kunitz, Sidney Crosby, Bill Guerin, Sergei Gonchar, Brooks Orpik, Marc-Andre Fleury. That's the starting line of the 2008/09 Pittsburgh Penguins. Two of the best power forwards in the NHL, one of the best goalies to come out of Quebec since some bloke named Patrick Roy, a lethal offensive defenseman, and a stay-at-home d-man who, some say, can cause an opposition forward to wet himself just by a raised eyebrow. Oh, and the best player to strap on a pair of skates since Wayne Gretzky, too. You can talk about the likes of Zetterberg, Datsyuk and Lidstrom all you like, but they aren't Sidney Crosby. And thus, they pale in comparison.

And then we have the rest of the roster. Evgeni Malkin, who, by the way, is like Alex Ovechkin, only even better. Jordan Staal-the best young forward in the NHL who isn't Crosby, Ovechkin or Malkin (Hang on-did someone say "Darren Helm"? Who's he?...). And a supporting cast including Petr Sykora and Ruslan Fedotenko, both Cup winners already...it's a murderer's row of forwards. Including two of the top five scorers in the NHL this season.

On defence-Kris Letang and the monster that is Hal Gill. This is a team that has a third line that can (and has) beaten many first lines...mainly because it has Miroslav Satan (a career NHL top-liner with over 350 goals) on it...simply because there was no space for him anywhere else.

Sure, you will say that the Red Wings and their loaded team came out on top last season. But that was last season. Even many Pens fans thought that team was a year too early.

This time round, though...there's a firm belief that the March of the Penguins will not be stopped. Especially not by a team whose best d-men are 47, 39, and 35, has the league's third-best Russian as their superstar, and is growing old faster and becoming more boring and over-praised than Susan Boyle (if you're not British, look her up)...

I predict Pens in six. Or more likely seven...

And no superstition about touching a conference trophy, never mind Chris Osgood and friends, can change that result...

Let's go Pens!