Pittsburgh Penguins Tickets

The Pittsburgh Penguins had big hopes coming into the season, but it seems as if those dreams were derailed somewhere along the way.

Pittsburgh finds itself in fourth place in the Atlantic Division, which is about four places lower than they had expected.

The Penguins reached the Stanley Cup Finals last year before bowing out gracefully to the Detroit Red Wings, so the team believed it was ready to take the next step and hoist the Cup this year.

To try and switch things up, the team has fired their head coach, hoping that it might provide some type of spark and increase the energy level.

Of course, whenever you talk about Pittsburgh hockey, the name Sidney Crosby immediately comes to mind.

Crosby was supposed to become the NHL's next superstar, the best player in the entire league. Instead, he has been upstaged over the past year or so by Washington Capitals forward Alexander Ovechkin.

In fact, Crosby has fought through injuries this year and isn't even the leading goal scorer on his own team.

That honor belongs to Evgeni Malkin, whose 82 points is significantly higher than that of Ovechkin. Malkin has scored 25 goals and also leads the club in assists with 57.

Petr Sykora has been most effective on the power play, tallying 13 goals. Sykora remains one of the best at this position in the conference.

Marc-Andre Fluery has been solid but unspectacular in goal. He sports a 2.81 goals against average and a save percentage of nearly 92 percent.

The Penguins are running out of time to position themselves for a postseason berth, and missing out on the playoffs this season would be an incredible disappointment that would not go unnoticed around the league.