Lemieux debut

Believe it or not, Penguins' season ticket sales fell during the summer after they drafted Mario Lemieux (1984), as this short piece from the Montreal Gazette relates. The article also reveals that 66's first game in Pittsburgh was in danger of not selling out. It's funny reading the comments of then-Pens PR man Paul Steigerwald, now the team's TV play-by-play voice, about the situation, basically heaping the blame on the visiting Canucks. It's doubtful that in today's tight-lipped, spic-and-span world of hockey PR you'd hear such bluntness. Would be nice, though.