Five Time Stanley Cup Champions, All Time Superstitious

The Pittsburgh Penguins have recently won the Stanley Cup in back-to-back years, but has that been by skill, or by their rituals?

What most people probably don’t know about the Penguins is that they have some of the most superstitious players in the league.

Their Captain, Sidney Crosby, takes the cake for the player with the most rituals, however. Crosby says that “there [are] just too many, it’s hard now after you do things for so long to know what is a superstition and what’s just part of your daily routine.”

One of Crosby’s most famous rituals is when he practices stick handling on the golden arches of the McDonald’s logo on the ice. He does this before every game in a scarily similar manner.

Non-superstitious defenseman Brian Dumoulin was able to develop a ritual from just being with the Penguins, as he is always the first skater on his team on the ice, right after goaltender Tristan Jarry.

Dumoulin says, “It wasn’t something that I always did, no one wanted to go first when I first got here and I was like, ‘I don’t really care. I’ll go first.’ Everyone was used to going in their same spot. And I was like ‘well, I’ll go, whatever. And then it seems like everyone just kind of has their routine, where they go, and it carries on down.”

This “battle” to be the first on the ice is nowhere near as hard-fought as the one to be the last of the ice after warmups.

Alternate captain Evgeni Malkin (nicknamed Geno) likes to make that his tradition after him and Crosby discussed it the first game they played together, but because of Geno’s seniority (he is a year older than Crosby), Crosby gave in.

Malkin also goes has a certain routine during warmups, skating of the bench, around the net, and then to the middle of the ice to pick up a puck.

Later, he stretches on the right faceoff circle.

Although these rituals seem chaotic, the players are still able to accomplish great things on the ice.

“The order is pretty funny when you think about guys going out to the ice,” Crosby says. There is no real dialogue as far as who goes where, but everyone falls in the exact same spot at the exact same time before a game. So, some of those guys say they are not superstitious, but they seem to always find their spot at the right time, so it’s just funny how it works.”

Sources:

https://www.nhl.com/penguins/news/inside-scoop-pens-routines-and-superstitions/c-296127208

https://pittsburgh.cbslocal.com/2017/05/01/crosby-im-probably-at-top-of-list-when-it-comes-to- superstitions/