A Flyer eats his words as Pens demolish Philly

Oct. 30 1990: Pens 6, Flyers 2

The Penguins earn their most lopsided win ever to this point at the Philadelphia Spectrum thanks to a solid, 60-minute team effort. The high compete factor was no doubt influenced by some ill-advised remarks the day before by Flyers’ defenseman Terry Carkner. “If we play the way we’re capable of playing, we should dominate them,” he told the Philadelphia Inquirer. “They’re a lot smaller than us. We should be able to physically keep them down for 60 minutes. It should be an easy game.”

Terry Carkner: Unwise words

The remarks were pinned up in the Penguins dressing room before the game, and they had an effect. “I think everybody took a look at it and it sunk in,” Kevin Stevens told the Pittsburgh Press. “I don’t know why he would pipe up like that.”

Pittsburgh outskated and outhustled the Flyers in the first and emerged with a 2-0 lead on goals by Stevens and Rob Brown. Carkner decided to do some talking with his stick, bringing the Flyers within one early in the second, but Pens big guy Jay Caulfield answered back less than a minute later. That was the end of Philly on this night in a game that turned out to be an easy one…for the Pens, of course.

Dale Tallon's career closes in Pittsbugh

At the 1970 NHL Entry Draft, the league’s two new teams, the Buffalo Sabres and Vancouver Canucks, participated in a roulette-style spinoff to determine which club would claim the first overall pick. The Sabres won it and took future Hall of Famer Gilbert Perreault. The losing Canucks chose second and went with defenseman Dale Tallon.

It was a fateful spin for both teams. The Sabres were in the Stanley Cup Final within five years, while the Canucks languished in (at best) mediocrity for years. Tallon was no Perreault and lasted only three seasons in Vancouver before being traded to the Chicago Black Hawks, where he enjoyed his most productive days.

Tallon was traded to Pittsburgh in October 1979 for a second round draft pick. "Tallon has a lot of class,” said Pens GM Baz Bastien at the time. “He had some great years in Vancouver and two big years in Chicago,” he said, somewhat overstating the hockey facts.

Talon, who also played center at times, was enjoying a decent season and had settled in well with his new teammates when on March 13, 1979, ironically during a game in Vancouver, he lost his footing while charging to the Canucks net and crashed into the goalpost. Broken leg. Season over.

He wouldn’t make it back to the lineup until late December of the following campaign, but two other smaller ailments sent him back to the sidelines. He’d return to play in the Pens' opening round playoff series against the Boston Bruins, but his tank was empty. Those games would turn out to be his last in the NHL.

A career that started in 1970 with so many huge expectations concluded a decade later, largely unfulfilled, in the black and gold of the Pittsburgh Penguins.

(Happy) Epilogue: Tallon has since gone on to a successful front office career in the NHL and is the current GM of the up-and-coming Florida Panthers.

Greg Enright is a writer, editor and Pens fan since the days of the blue uniforms. Follow him on Twitter @penguinshistory.

Paiement closes career as a Penguin

Wilf Paiement was the second overall pick in the 1974 NHL Entry Draft, taken by the expansion Kansas City Scouts. The 6'4", 210-pound right winger was supposed to be the Scouts' version of Buffalo's Gilbert Perreault, a young superstar around whom the franchise could build.

The Scouts, however, had little else in the way of talent and could barely win a handful of games. After two dismal years in K.C. the team moved to Colorado to become the Rockies, and Paiement went along with them. The scenery changed but the losing continued. Paiement put up some impressive numbers nonetheless, tallying 40 goals in 1976-77 and 87 points the following year. In 1979 he was traded to the Toronto Maple Leafs in the infamous deal for Lanny McDonald, and two years later he went to the Quebec Nordiques.

After one-season stops in New York with the Rangers and Buffalo, Paiement's hockey road wound its way to the Penguins, where he was penciled in as Mario Lemieux's right winger on the Pens' top line to start the 1987-88 campaign.

Paiement got off to a solid start, scoring a goal in each of the team's first two games, but after that it was all downhill. He was demoted to the Penguins' farm team in Muskegon in mid-November - his first ever stint in the minors.

"After we took him off the power play he seemed to stop working," said Pens GM Eddie Johnston at the time. "He definitely hasn't played up to expectations."

Paiement did return for six more games in January but with a nagging knee injury and little production (1 assist in those six games) the writing was on the wall. Wilf Paiement played his final NHL game January 10, 1988 wearing a Penguins uniform - a 7-5 loss to the Red Wings in Detroit.

Lemieux bags 8 points vs. Blues

The St. Louis Blues came to Pittsburgh on October 15, 1988 after engaging in an 8-8 war the night before with the Detroit Red Wings. Before a sellout crowd at the Igloo, Mario Lemieux capitalized on the bedraggled Blues and turned in the most productive performance of his career. Le Magnifique bettered his career best one-game total by 2, registering a spectacular 8-point night, with two goals and six assists in a 9-2 Pens victory.

The Blues put up little fight, registering only 22 shots. "After [the Blues'] second goal, I was a spectator. And I had a great seat," said Pens goalie Steve Guenette.

Some of Lemieux's other teammates were getting used to their teammate's heroics, however. Defenseman Zarley Zalapski admitted he wasn't even aware of Number 66's point total, while Rob Brown, who was the happy recipient of Lemieux's passing, scoring his first career hat trick, said "It's Mario Lemieux. You expect  it. If he only gets three or four points, you think he has a broken leg."

For his part, Lemieux was ready to move on. "It was a great game, but tomorrow I have to forget about it."

Oct 5/90: Pens 7, Caps 4

The 1990-91 Penguins opened the season on the road against the Washington Capitals on October 5, minus superstar captain Mario Lemiuex, who was out indefinitely with an inflammation in the disc area of his back.

Despite new coach Bob Johnson’s emphasis on defense in training camp, the game turned into a wild affair with Pittsburgh outgunning the hosts 7-4. Left Wing Keving Stevens and his centerman John Cullen each turned in Mario-like performances, Stevens getting a whopping two goals and four assists, while Cullen tallied five assists.

It was the team’s overall resiliency that brought a smile to Johnson’s face, however. “The ability to come back in their building is the thing that please me,” said the coach.

1990-91 record: 1-0-0