Penguins first semi-final - 1970

The puck will drop tomorrow on the Penguins' seventh Stanley Cup semi-final series (or Conference Final, as they're now known). They are 3-3 overall. The Pens played their first one in only their third year of existence, in the 1969-70 season, against the St. Louis Blues. That sounds impressive, but one must remember that all they had to do to make it that far back then was to beat out two of their other five expansion brethren for one of the four playoff spots in the NHL's West Division (which grouped all six new teams together), and then win a playoff round against one of them.

Mission accomplished on both fronts. The Penguins, after missing the playoffs in their first two years, claimed second place in the West and then took out the Oakland Seals in four straight in the first round.

In the Blues, they faced a team that had proved to be the best in the West the previous two years, only to be swept by the mighty Montreal Canadiens in both Final series.

The 1970 Pens-Blues series, according to the press reports, was a red-knuckle slugfest. This wire story following a Game 1 Penguins 3-1 loss has some tough talk from Pens coach Red Kelly, whose Irish temper seems to have been brought to a boil by the Blues.

The Penguins would lose the first two games, prompting Blues coach and future Penguin bench boss Scotty Bowman to make a bold assertion, one that would surely be jumped on by the opposition and media in today's era. See the third column of this playoff summary story.

The Penguins would eventually fall in six games to the Blues, who would again be swept in the Final, this time by the Boston Bruins and Bobby Orr, who ended the series with his famous "flying though the air" Cup clinching-goal. The Penguins would not reach the semi-final round again until 1991.

Penguins-Flyers - 1989 playoffs

The Penguins and Flyers are battling it out in the playoffs this year, just as they were 20 years ago, for the first time. This year, the Pens are up 2-0 and in control heading into Philly this afternoon. Back in '89, the two clubs headed into Game 3 tied, after the Flyers rebounded from a Game 1 loss with a 4-2 win in the second tilt. The Battle of Pennsylvania was finally living up to its title, after the Flyers had spent the 70s and 80s pretty much pummeling the Pittsburghers every chance they got.

This second-round series would ultimately go the full 7, with Philadelphia proving they had no interest in reversing their winning trend and taking the rubber match decisively 4-1. As a Pens fan, that was hard to take, seeing as Mario and Co. had built a 3-2 series lead and blew it - at home, to boot.

The day before Game 3, though, Pens coach Gene Ubriaco preached to his troops about the mindset required to win the Stanley Cup, as chronicled in this article from the Arpil 21, 1989 Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. The players were listening - at least for a little while. The Pens would take Game 3 by a 4-3 score.