Marc-Andre Fleury seems ready for his last tango in Pittsburgh – Twin Cities

PITTSBURGH — Sidney Crosby has heard this before. Last year, in mid-December, the Wild were last in Pittsburgh with goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury, who was reportedly playing his final NHL season.

Fleury did not play in that game, a 4-3 Penguins victory, and the sold-out crowd at PPG Paints Arena was audibly upset at not getting to see their Flower play one last time before Fleury hung up the pads for a 20-year match . NHL career.

That won’t happen on Tuesday, when Fleury will start in net for a puck drop at 6 p.m. against his former team, and Crosby was asked if he saw his old Penguins teammate play one last time in the arena where the pair share mattered. three Stanley Cup-winning teams.

“Yeah, I’ve thought that a few times, so I don’t know,” he said. “You’ll have to ask him if you’re sure.”

Fleury, 39, has been asked that a few times since training camp started on September 19, and the answer has always been an affirmation. This will be the 21st and final year of a career whose next stop will be the Hockey Hall of Fame. He said it again, unprompted, during a press conference with media from Minnesota and Pennsylvania.

“It’s clear that I want to play well and always do well. I want to put on a good show here one last time, right?” he said.

Fleury makes his discomfort known with extra prominence, and it will likely come at him in waves on Tuesday, where his wife, two daughters and mother will be in the crowd. But on Monday he seemed very comfortable with it.

After a Wild practice at the Penguins’ practice facility about 20 miles north of downtown, Fleury got about 30 feet off the ice before signing a hockey stick — one of his old ones, it turned out — for a fan who drove here from Syracuse, NY, and an autograph for another one. On his way to the locker room, he jumped onto another rink and took about 20 shots of the Penguins Elite Youth team, which was holding a camp.

Fleury has always been a friendly person and approachable superstar, and that reached its peak here during the first 13 seasons.

Looking at him, it seems that this last trip to the Steel City has little to do with the great success he had here. Or about former teammates Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and Kris Letang, and other personnel still associated with the club he played for from 2003 to 2017. It concerns many more people than that.

It’s about Penguins fans, who embraced Fleury as soon as the Penguins drafted him with the first pick in the 2003 entry draft. He likes them and is comfortable with them, and unless the Wild and Penguins advance to the Stanley Cup final, this will be his last match for them.

When the Penguins left him unprotected for the 2017 expansion draft, Fleury knew he was already on his way out, but two days before the draft he was at a Dick’s Sporting Goods store in Cranberry Township signing autographs and chatting with fans talk.

He wouldn’t leave without a proper farewell.

“It was important because the support I’ve gotten here over the years has been great, and there were hard times, and people still had my back and pushed me and helped me,” he said Monday. “Our building had been full for I don’t know how many years. People came, watched the games, cheered us on.

“So for me it was just a way to meet some of them and thank them for their support.”

Asked about that bond, Letang said of his old teammate: “What’s not to love?”

“That’s the question, honestly,” he continued. “Just his personality, there’s not a mean bone in his body. He comes to the rink with a big smile on his face. He plays the game with a big smile. He’s obviously a great teammate. So it’s hard not to love a guy like that, especially if he came in as an 18-year-old.

“First overall pick, a lot of pressure, but he comes to the rink with the same mentality, the same mentality, fights hard and he does it with a smile. He and Sid are the ones who put the franchise back on track. The rest is history.”

The Penguins are a hurting team, losers of their past five games (0-4-1). The Wild are licking the wounds from their first regular-season loss, a 7-5 setback in Philadelphia on Saturday that was often as ugly as the score would indicate.

For those wondering if he’ll be able to shake off the distractions, consider that with a chance to pass Patrick Roy for second all-time on the NHL career wins list, Fleury passed his former idol with the 74th shutout of his career in a 5 -0 victory over the New York Islanders last January.

“He knows how to handle it,” Wild coach John Hynes said. “I think in those moments he rises to the occasion, and I know when the game starts he will be ready to play, and I’m sure he will handle everything like he has in the past.”

Fleury plans to be ready.

“I think maybe you need to take a deep breath, take a good look around you and keep some good memories,” he said. “I was lucky to play here for so long, there are a lot of souvenirs from this place, so it will be nice to play again.”