JAROME IGINLA NOW A PENGUIN (Boston fans must be royally ticked off now)

**RuthlessBurgher** · 03-28-2013, 02:10 AM

Iginla was a healthy scratch tonight, signaling that a deal could be imminent. The Bruins also held out prospects Khoklachev and Bartkowski from action as well, since the two of them were reported to be going to Calgary along with a conditional 1st round pick. However, these reports were unconfirmed, and when we finally got official word from the Flames (within the last half hour in the middle of the night), Iggy was being sent to Pittsburgh for our 2013 1st round pick plus forward prospects Kenneth Agonstino (5th round pick in 2010, currently playing at Yale) and Ben Hanowski (3rd round pick in 2009, who just finished his college career at St. Cloud State). Wow...we got Jarome Iginla, Brenden Morrow, and Douglas Murray for only draft picks and prospects...no current NHL players were involved. Iggy played on a line with Sid in the Olympics, so they already have chemistry from playing together en route to a gold medal for Canada. Reuniting Sid with Iginla allows us to put Kunitz back onto Geno and Neal's line, where they flourished last season (Malkin scored 50 goals and got an MVP while Neal lit the lamp 40 times himself with Kunitz camped out in front of the net). Imagine the line combinations now...

Iginla-Crosby-Dupuis
Kunitz-Malkin-Neal
Morrow-Sutter-Bennett
Cooke-Adams-Glass

With Kennedy, Jeffrey, and Vitale available for depth.

On defense, once Letang gets healthy, you'll have multiple quality offensive defensemen who can skate/pass/shoot with the best of them (Letang and Depres), multiple quality defensive defensemen who can hit/block shots/clear out the front of the next with the best of them (Orpik and Murray), and multiple quality well-rounded defensemen who can give you a little bit of both, contributing to both the power play as well as the penalty kill in addition to their even strength duties (Martin and Niskanen). We have Engelland, Eaton, and Bortuzzo has depth options as well.

Man, this is an exciting time to be a Pens fan...Shero is really going for it all right now. Should be great fun to watch.

**Ghost** · 03-28-2013, 08:53 AM

Looks like Iginla drove this deal. He wanted to be with the Pens. It was all but a done deal with the Bruins when Shero stepped in and made the offer he did. History favors the bold! Didn't lose a top 5 prospect in any of the deal. Hopefully Iggy does his best Ray Bourque impression and the change of scenary brings him up a couple of levels. This is awesome!.