With the game 7 win over the defending Stanley Cup champion Detroit Red Wings the Pittsburgh Penguins lifted their first trophy in 17 years giving the city their second championship in a year. Prior to the presentation of the Cup, Evgeni Malkin was awarded the Conn Smythe trophy as the MVP of the playoffs notching 36 points to lead all scorers.

It will be interesting to see how this trophy plays out at the leagues award ceremony on June 18th with Malkin being up for the Hart.

Malkin is the first ever Russian born player to collect the honor and second Penguin after Mario Lemieux raised it twice in the last two cup wins. He along with fellow comrades Sergei Gonchar and Ruslan Fedentenko are the latest Russians/Ukrainians to get their names etched on the cup. For both Malkin and Gonchar this is their first cup in their careers with Gonchar having played since 1994.

Fedentenko’s name is already on hockey’s holy grail as he won it with Tampa Bay in 2004. It will be interesting to see where the players choose to bring the cup on their day with it during the summer.

With the next meaningful hockey game about 3.5 months away updates will be few and far but do stay tuned as July 1st marks another year of the free-agency frenzy which will be monitored closely by all of us here. We leave you now with CBC’s playoff montage found below.