A Front-Row Seat with the Sportswriters Who Sat There
Sit down with host Todd Jones and other sportswriters who knew the greatest athletes and coaches, and experienced first-hand some of the biggest sports moments in the past 50 years. They’ll share stories behind the stories -- some they’ve only told to each other.
Dave Molinari: “Lemieux Taxed the Limits of my Ability to Describe What I Saw.”
We head to the rink for hockey talk with Dave Molinari, a Hall of Fame writer who has covered the Pittsburgh Penguins and NHL since 1983. His legendary dry, sharp wit comes through in tales about superstars Mario Lemieux and Sidney Crosby, as well as other great players who have produced five Stanley Cup championships during his tenure on the beat. Molinari tells us about coaching legends Herb Brooks and “Badger” Bob Johnson, a playoff game lasting five overtimes, and old arenas that made the hair stand up on his neck. You’ll laugh about Gene Ubriaco’s escape tunnel, Lou Angotti’s epic rant, and witch doctors entering the press box.
Molinari was enshrined in the media wing of the Hockey Hall of Fame in 2009 when he received the Elmer Ferguson Memorial Award for print journalism, which is given each year by the Professional Hockey Writers' Association. After beginning his journalism career at the McKeesport Daily News, Molinari joined the Pittsburgh Press as a copy editor in 1980. That paper assigned him to cover the Penguins and NHL in the summer of 1983. When the Pittsburgh Press folded at the end of 1992, Molinari moved to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and continued covering the Penguins and NHL until 2017, when his primary responsibility became Penn State football. He returned to hockey writing and the Penguins beat in June 2019 when, after 39-plus years at newspapers, he joined DK Pittsburgh Sports, a subscription website. Molinari began writing for a different website, Pittsburgh Hockey Now, in May 2022.
After growing up in the McKeesport suburbs of Glassport and Elizabeth Township near Pittsburgh, Molinari earned a journalism degree from Penn State. He is the author of two books:
“Mario Lemieux: Best There Ever Was,” written along with Ron Cook and Chuck Finder.
“Best in the Game: The Turbulent Story of the Pittsburgh Penguins' Rise to Stanley Cup Champions”
You can follow Dave on X: @MolinariPGH
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Dave Molinari edited transcript
Todd Jones (00:00):
Hey, Dave, thanks for joining us on Press Box Access.
Dave Molinari (00:04):
Oh, it's my pleasure, Todd. Thank you for having me.
Todd Jones (00:07):
I'm so glad you can join us. I know you're very busy, still covering the NHL and the Pittsburgh Penguins as a beat, which you started doing in 1983 back when Reagan was the president, four decades. That's incredible on one beat.
Dave Molinari (00:23):
Yeah, it's been quite a ride, and it certainly was a long one. And I was fortunate, I've covered a franchise that was truly awful, was truly great, but was never boring.
Todd Jones (00:38):
That's right.
Dave Molinari (00:39):
From pretty much my first day on the beat, they made a significant trade and it really never slowed down since that. I was lucky enough to get the job I wanted when I was a kid. And it's been everything I could have expected it to be. And probably then some.
Todd Jones (01:05):
Well, you certainly have seen everything, five Stanley Cup winners, bad teams, old arenas, new arenas, team bankruptcies, some of the greatest players to ever play hockey. Mario Lemieux, Sidney Crosby, Jagr, Malkin, on and on.
Todd Jones (01:20):
Not to be flip, but do you kind of feel like a historian?
Dave Molinari (01:25):
No, no. I really don't. I guess I tended to get just caught up in the day-to-day coverage and never really looked at the big picture.
Dave Molinari (01:40):
I mean, I recognized that the franchise that covering was my primary responsibility was extraordinarily fortunate with some of the players who passed through there. They had a once in a lifetime talent pass through about once every 10 years which is not the norm to say the least.
Todd Jones (02:04):
That has not happened in Columbus, by the way.
Dave Molinari (02:07):
And there is a number of other markets where that hasn't happened either. And for Pittsburgh, beginning with Mario Lemieux's arrival in 1984, to follow that up six years later with Jagr, and then a couple decades later with Evgeni Malkin, and a year after that, Sidney Crosby was pretty extraordinary.
Dave Molinari (02:31):
And I mean, that's without even bringing guys into the conversation, like Marc-Andre Fleury, who's a pretty good bet to make it into the Hall of Fame. And some of the Hall of Famers who were on Pittsburgh's early Stanley Cup teams. Paul Coffey, Larry Murphy, Joey Mullen, people like that.
Dave Molinari (02:52):
So, I've been fortunate enough to be in locker rooms that were occupied by some of the better players in recent NHL history to put it lightly.
Todd Jones (03:06):
Well, they've been covered by one of the greater writers of his era. I mean, you were honored by the Professional Hockey Writers Association in 2009 with the Elmer Ferguson Memorial Award, which presented at the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto.
Todd Jones (03:22):
And you're still doing it, still covering it for the Pittsburgh Hockey now website. And this is after a tenure at the Pittsburgh press from '83 to '92, and then the Post Gazette, and then at another website, DK Pittsburgh Sports. So, you've been there day after day after day.
Todd Jones (03:38):
I want to start with the idea of the road, 40 plus years on the road. And I know that Pittsburgh's been honored to have Mike Lange, who did 46 years as the announcer, also a Hall of Famer, retired.
Todd Jones (03:55):
They also had Tom McMillan, longtime Penguin's VP of Communications. But before that, he was the beat writer for the Post Gazette when you were at the press.
We had actually been coworkers at the Pittsburgh Press way back in those ancient times.
Dave Molinari (06:39):
The Press was one of the metropolitan papers that actually put out specialized suburban sections. We had five of them at one time, and Tommy and I were on the staff of the suburban sections together before he went and briefly had a job in San Diego.
Dave Molinari (07:00):
When he returned to Pittsburgh, he went to the Post Gazette, and we ended up as competitors. Certainly, I regard him as the best writer against whom I ever competed. He was a very good reporter too.
Dave Molinari (07:21):
He made my life difficult. I'd like to think that I did the same for him. But it really never imperiled our friendship. We were close throughout that.
Dave Molinari (07:37):
And I mean, as evidenced by the fact that I asked him to be my presenter in Toronto for the Hall of Fame weekend, I think tells you the affection and respect I have for him not only as a competitor, but as a pro in the positions that he went on to after he left newspapers.
Todd Jones (11:27):
Hey, we're going to talk about Lemieux, and Crosby, and great players, great games. But another thing I wanted to ask you about as we get rolling here, is the idea of four decades of traveling around covering hockey. You have seen so many different arenas also.
Todd Jones (12:02):
Do you have some favorite arenas or ones that you just despised as a journalist?
Dave Molinari (13:24):
But no, I am pretty partial to some of the old arenas that are no longer there. I mean, the Montreal Forum is by far my favorite building of all time. I mean, as a hockey fan, I don't know that you could walk into that building, just simply enter it without having the hair on the back of your neck stand up.
Dave Molinari (13:53):
I mean, there was a lot of talk of the ghosts in the Forum, and I'm not necessarily a believer in such things, but I could almost believe it when you're talking about that place.
Dave Molinari (14:05):
It was just the essence of hockey in that building. Even at morning skates, you could feel it. It was just the most special place to watch a hockey game.
Dave Molinari (14:21):
I felt the same way, to a lesser extent, about the Boston Garden, and for that matter, Chicago Stadium. They were all more intimate than most contemporary buildings are. They would have capacities in the mid-teens.
Dave Molinari (14:38):
In Chicago Stadium, I think the ceiling was about 12 feet above ice level. So, the sound in there just got deafening. The crowd there was loud to begin with. And then just because of the way the building was structured, the seats were angled in a way that no fire marshal now, would ever approve.
Todd Jones (15:05):
The old Boston Garden that had a smaller rink, right?
Dave Molinari (15:09):
Oh, yeah. As did Chicago Stadium and The Aud in Buffalo, and that was a A-U-D although you could make a case for O-D-D.
Dave Molinari (15:18):
Yeah. Then they took that space generally out of the neutral zones. So, in a place like the Garden, you could have 15 feet between the blue lines.
Dave Molinari (15:33):
It certainly made for a home ice advantage for the team that played there 40 or so times a year, as opposed to the ones that had to come in and try to adjust.
Todd Jones (15:45):
You had a unique looking place in Pittsburgh, The Igloo, the original arena of the Penguins. I was only in there for a basketball game of all things. I think Duquesne played a game there I covered once, and there was about four people and seven pigeons there. What was The Igloo like for people-
Dave Molinari (16:02):
They must had some sort of ticket giveaway that night if they got that many.
Todd Jones (16:07):
Well, yeah, the pigeons loved it. What was the igloo like for somebody who never went to the old Igloo in Pittsburgh?
Dave Molinari (16:15):
I thought it was okay. There's a lot of nostalgia surrounding it now, but it had clearly outlived its usefulness. I mean, it was novel because at least for a time, they could open the roof. I believe it was three quarters of the way, maybe two thirds of the way. It had leaves that they could make overlap.
Todd Jones (16:39):
Wait a minute, were they trying to capture all the sunshine in Pittsburgh? Is that what it was?
Dave Molinari (16:43):
Well, yeah, those three days a year you want to take full advantage. But no, I mean, and it was pretty nice when they did that. Pittsburgh back in the '70s, had a team in World TeamTennis, the Pittsburgh Triangles. And they would routinely open the roof for that.
Dave Molinari (17:05):
And I went to some concerts at the civic arena where they would open the roof and I mean, it was genuinely a nice feature.
Dave Molinari (17:12):
But eventually, things like updated scoreboards became too heavy. And opening the roof was no longer an option for, gee, I couldn't even tell you how many years before the place finally closed in 2010.
Todd Jones (17:31):
That's crazy. I do not remember the roof being open at The Igloo. That's crazy.
Dave Molinari (17:37):
They didn't do it very often for hockey or basketball games. But yeah, like I say, for concerts and for those World TeamTennis matches, that was kind of a regular feature, weather permitting.
Todd Jones (17:53):
Okay. There was another old arena in Philadelphia, The Spectrum. And The Spectrum was back in the day for the Penguins, just a house of horrors. They went through a streak back in the '70s and '80s where they were like 0-39-3 at The Spectrum.
Todd Jones (18:10):
But that all changed on February 2nd, 1989, Pittsburgh finally got a victory in the building. But I think there were some witch doctors involved with this, right?
Dave Molinari (18:22):
Oh, there were two disc jockeys from Pittsburgh's most popular radio station. Their morning guys made the trip to Philadelphia and dressed up as witch doctors intent on breaking the curse, which was largely a byproduct of the Flyers always having better players than the Penguins did.
Todd Jones (18:48):
Yeah, imagine that. I mean, we always try to blame a goat or something, but usually, it's the other team's just better.
Dave Molinari (18:55):
Yeah. And that certainly was the case for most of those 15 years. But the two DJs set up in the back of the press box that night, which was a very cramped press box. Just two rows with about 18 inches of space behind each chair before you ran into a wall.
Dave Molinari (19:22):
But they set up there, and I recall them having dressed in what one would associate with traditional witch doctor garb. And I remember them asking McMillan to go back and appear on the air with them.
Dave Molinari (19:38):
And the highlight of their exchange being when they asked McMillan to rub their bone.
Todd Jones (19:46):
Wait a minute, what? Hold on a second.
Dave Molinari (19:50):
Well, that's where the traditional garb comes in. They were in suitable makeup, I guess, in carrying props, one of which was a bone.
Dave Molinari (20:02):
I'm not sure that the radio audience was aware of exactly what they were referring to when they asked Tommy to rub their bone. But in any case, he obliged, so.
Todd Jones (20:16):
So, Tom rubbed their bone, and it ended.
Dave Molinari (20:19):
Whether that was responsible for them winning that night, I guess we'll never know.
Todd Jones (20:23):
Alright, for the record, Dave, did you rub the bone?
Dave Molinari (20:25):
I did not. I am not even photogenic enough to appear on radio. So, no.
Todd Jones (20:35):
And for the record, that was the Pittsburgh morning team on WDVE FM of Scott Paulsen and Jim Krenn, who were the witch doctors that ended the streak for the Penguins.
Dave Molinari (20:48):
That is correct.
Todd Jones (20:49):
Well, speaking of the Flyers and the Penguins, they've had one of the great rivalries in sports, certainly in hockey. And there's another game that I want to bring up to you.
Todd Jones (20:59):
And this is a little more serious topic because I think it really fits with the drama and just the love of the game, the excitement, but also, the challenge for journalists. And that's on May 4th, 2000, game four, the Eastern Conference semifinals in Pittsburgh. You got the Flyers and the Penguins.
Todd Jones (21:18):
They dropped the puck a little after seven or so. And about seven hours later, they finished the game. The game went to five overtimes, Flyers won 2-1. 12:01 of the fifth OT. What do you remember about covering that game?
Dave Molinari (21:38):
That it was a bit longer than most. I believe it ended at 2:37 or 2:38 in the morning. I couldn't tell you exactly. I can certainly see Keith Primeau of the Flyers scoring the game winning goal.
Dave Molinari (21:54):
But really my biggest memory associated with that was well, the impact that it had on the rest of the series. Pittsburgh had actually opened that series by winning two games in Philadelphia, which was quite unusual.
Dave Molinari (22:19):
But they proceeded to lose the next four. And I think that that five overtime loss was the gut punch that really did them in. It was not only physically draining for them as it had to be for the Flyers as well, but emotionally, that was really tough.
Dave Molinari (22:45):
And to have it happen at home when they had a chance to take a choke hold on the series, I think was bordered on psychologically devastating for them. And it certainly looked that way for the balance of the series.
Todd Jones (23:01):
Well, one of the many great things about playoff hockey obviously, is there's no shootout. You just don't know when it's going to end, which is great for drama and fans.
Todd Jones (23:09):
But when you're a writer and you're covering a game that goes to five overtimes, what was it like that night for you to try to write as this was unfolding?
Dave Molinari (23:19):
Well, we got to a point long before the game ended where all the deadlines were passed so it wasn't ... I don't believe that there was a Post Gazette online presence yet. I honestly, can't remember.
Dave Molinari (23:40):
But even if there was, I would've simply filed a game story as soon as Primeau scored. And that would've been it for that evening. We wouldn't have done any follow up at the time. Everything would've been gathered and written for the next day. So, that wasn't bad.
Dave Molinari (24:04):
And I also had a little experience in that regard. In 1996, the Penguins had played a four overtime game in Washington that ended at 2:16 or 2:17 in the morning. Petr Nedved scored a goal to win that one for the Penguins.
Dave Molinari (24:24):
So, these longest games in NHL history were kind of becoming old hat for me at that point. Something that came up every few years.
Todd Jones (24:37):
I think about-
Dave Molinari (24:39):
I don't miss having had one of those lately though. That's way past my bedtime these days.
Todd Jones (24:50):
Yeah, me too. I think there were actually children sleeping in the arena in some of the game reports of that five overtime game when the Flyers won 2-1.
Dave Molinari (25:00):
Oh, yeah. And I mean, there was a surprising number of people who were still in the building when that happened, considering that a lot of them probably had to go to work the next morning. Whether they bothered going to bed after leaving, I guess we'll never know.
Todd Jones (25:13):
Well, they ran out of beer in the arena, right?
Dave Molinari (25:16):
Yeah. And that might've been what the organization saw as the biggest setback of the whole night was all those lost sales.
Dave Molinari (25:23):
And I'm sure some of the fans missed it too. But yeah, I forget what overtime it was when basically all the concession stands ran out of everything they had to offer.
Todd Jones (25:41):
Or even the teams had like pizza in the locker room or something.
Dave Molinari (25:44):
Yeah. I guess you try to carbo load as much as you can when these games get significantly past 60 minutes. And you don't know when they're going to end. You don't know that a game isn't going to go five overtime.
Dave Molinari (26:01):
So, yeah, anytime in intermission, there are pizzas and all kinds of food that whatever they can come up with to give guys to try to give them a little energy.
Todd Jones (26:15):
Yeah. Goaltender, Ron Tugnutt, who took the loss despite stopping 72 shots, he said he lost 12 pounds at that game.
Dave Molinari (26:26):
And I believe he spent a little time with the Jackets too.
Todd Jones (26:31):
Yeah, he did.
Dave Molinari (26:32):
Guys there might be able to tell you he probably didn't have 12 pounds to lose. He was not a particularly large man to begin with, so. No, he played well. It was quite a valiant effort on his part.
Dave Molinari (26:47):
It was you go out there and you play high intensity hockey for well over two hours, you're putting in an honest night's work. And I guess that's one of the great things about playoff hockey. Nobody's ever stolen a Stanley Cup.
Todd Jones (29:10):
Well, the emotion of the Stanley Cup playoffs. When I think about hockey, I think of emotion, and I think the passion of the fans, the fan bases, and the players and the coaches, it's so built into the game. And I think about in terms of coaches too.
Todd Jones (29:27):
Over to your career, you have covered so many different coaches. They all have different personalities. I was going to ask you, by the way, who was the coach who once ripped Lemieux and Paul Coffey?
Dave Molinari (29:40):
Gene Ubriaco said that it was like a ... I forget if it was to both or just about Coffey, that it was like trying to teach a shark table manners.
Todd Jones (29:55):
He said that on the record?
Dave Molinari (29:57):
Yes, I believe to a newspaper in Baltimore initially. And I want to say that we found out about it because it was picked up by a newspaper in or around Hershey, PA, which like Baltimore ...
Dave Molinari (30:15):
Well, Baltimore was where Ubriaco had coached previously, and where I believe his family still lived at the time. So, yeah, that was not well received.
Todd Jones (30:32):
Yeah. How did Lemieux and Coffey, two of the all time greats, how did they respond to that?
Dave Molinari (30:38):
Well, Ubriaco was gone already. I believe this was in the 1990, '91 season. And I remember it was at a game we learned of it, McMillan and I, we were covering a game at the Met Center in Bloomington, Minnesota.
Dave Molinari (30:56):
And Coffey and Lemieux after the game pulled both of us into the trainer's room (which would be absolutely unthinkable today when teams won't even tell you what kind of injury a player has, let alone pull you into an area where guys are being treated) to give us their reactions to what Ubriaco had said.
Dave Molinari (31:27):
I honestly cannot tell you what they said. Certainly nothing as memorable as like trying to teach a shark table manners. But suffice to say, they did not endorse his observation and as I recall, did not speak highly of the performance he had put in as their coach
Todd Jones (31:55):
And how would you look back on that performance as coach, when he was coach of the Penguins?
Dave Molinari (32:00):
I was not terribly impressed. He had been a pretty successful minor league coach in Baltimore, where the Penguins American Hockey League affiliate was based for a number of years.
Dave Molinari (32:16):
But he really did not react well to criticism. And as his tenure in Pittsburgh was winding down, he reacted so badly to the jeers of fans as he walked across the ice from the Penguins locker room runway to the bench, which was necessary in the old Civic Arena.
Dave Molinari (32:51):
That the maintenance people at the arena constructed a tunnel of sorts from like the bowels of the arena that came out at the back of the bench. And that Ubriaco literally had to crawl to get through to get to the bench.
Dave Molinari (33:09):
But that he did, rather than make that walk across the ice and have the fans express their displeasure with his work.
Todd Jones (33:18):
He was like a tunnel rat.
Dave Molinari (33:19):
Exactly, yeah. There aren't many things I've only seen once in my career, but that is something no coach before or after has repeated anything even remotely similar to that. At least not of which I am aware.
Todd Jones (33:41):
So, what became of the tunnel when Gene was gone?
Dave Molinari (33:46):
I don't know if they bothered to seal it. I suspect it might've still been there until the day they tore down the building.
Todd Jones (33:58):
It's like Al Capone's Vault.
Todd Jones (34:03):
Well, another coach I wanted to ask you briefly about is a guy that hockey fans, the hardcore fans certainly remember this, but I don't know if a lot of sports fans realize that he coached the Penguins for a year.
Todd Jones (34:14):
Because when you say Herb Brooks, you immediately think of the Miracle on Ice, the 1980 US Olympic team upsetting the Soviet Union, and then going on to win the gold medal. One of the great sports moments in American history, all of Olympic history.
Todd Jones (34:29):
But Herb actually coached the Penguins for a year in 1999 and 2000. And I was looking back and there was actually a pretty good moment involving Herb who was ... well, you describe what Herb was like as a coach to cover.
Dave Molinari (34:45):
I had an exceptionally good relationship with him. I'm not sure why. I had known him a bit before he joined the Penguins. Before Craig Patrick, who was the general manager at the time, brought him into the organization as a scout.
Dave Molinari (35:04):
But for whatever reason, we got along exceptionally well. One of my most prized possessions is a book that Herb gave me. Signed the book. Had absolutely nothing to do with hockey. It was called Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom, the Detroit writer.
Dave Molinari (35:34):
But we would often have long talks, very rarely about hockey. He was just a really interesting man. His knowledge of hockey and fuel for the game was extraordinary. I loved the style of game that he coached. He was aggressive attacking. He liked speed, he liked skill.
Dave Molinari (36:06):
And he was brought in to replace Kevin Constantine, whose approach to coaching had pretty much been diametrically opposed to that of Herb Brooks and who coincidentally or otherwise, Brooks did not particularly care for on a personal level. And I think also probably on a professional level.
Dave Molinari (36:33):
But no, he was great for me to deal with. I could see certainly where if you were on his wrong side, he could make life miserable for you.
Dave Molinari (36:48):
But I was lucky enough to ... we certainly didn't see everything exactly the same, but if I was ever on the wrong side of him, I apparently didn't stay there for very long.
Dave Molinari (37:03):
And it was really heartbreaking when he died in an auto accident not long after he gave up coaching the Penguins.
Todd Jones (37:20):
Yeah. August of 2003, Herb died in a car accident, left us way too soon. Did he ever reflect much with you about the 1980 Miracle on Ice?
Dave Molinari (37:33):
No, he was always very much more looking forward as opposed to looking back, whether it was back at those Olympics, which obviously are what people are going to remember him for best or his other coaching jobs like with the Rangers. Or even at the University of Minnesota.
Dave Molinari (38:02):
It's funny, he is one of my favorite all time Penguin's coaches, and probably the guy who ... I certainly regard him as the best coach in Penguin's history.
Dave Molinari (38:22):
And certainly, talking about someone taken from us far too early, Bob Johnson who coached only one season in Pittsburgh before being diagnosed with terminal brain cancer.
Dave Molinari (38:39):
He was only there for a year, but that was long enough to not only change the culture of an entire organization that had been around for a quarter century, but to lead it to not only its first division championship, but to the franchise's first Stanley Cup.
Dave Molinari (39:01):
And to really establish a culture that has largely endured to this day. And I think you can still see his fingerprints on successes that the Penguins have had in recent years.
Dave Molinari (39:22):
And he was the most genuinely upbeat person I've ever been around, and probably numbers 2 through 10 as well. His most famous expression was, "It's a great day for hockey." And I think he genuinely believed that, even on the most steamy day in mid-August.
Dave Molinari (39:48):
I remember my favorite story about him in that regard actually comes from when he was coaching in Calgary and the Flames had just lost their 11th consecutive game. It was in Hartford.
Dave Molinari (40:05):
And one of the Calvary writers asked him about it. And Bob Johnson, in responding to that question made a reference to our so-called losing streak. Which I think for most people, when you've dropped 11 in a row, you're not going to have any qualms about acknowledging it as a losing streak.
Dave Molinari (40:30):
But I mean, that was genuine Bob Johnson. I really wondered early in his tenure, when I was around him on a daily basis, whether there was at least some degree of phoniness to him, because I didn't think anybody could really be that upbeat all the time about everything.
Dave Molinari (40:57):
But he was, and he convinced me. And I'm skeptical just about everything. And he made me a believer in Bob Johnson.
Dave Molinari (41:13):
And it would've been really interesting to see what the Penguins could have accomplished into the mid '90s if he had been alive and had continued to coach them because he was as important to that franchise then as anybody who was on the ice.
Dave Molinari (41:41):
And that was a team that included I think, more than half a dozen Hall of Famers led by Mario Lemieux.
Todd Jones (41:48):
Yeah. And Jagr was a young player on that 1991 team.
Dave Molinari (41:52):
Tom Barrasso, Joe Mullen, Larry Murphy, Paul Coffey, Ronnie Francis. It was an extraordinary collection of talent.
Dave Molinari (42:03):
But Badger made that team and that organization, which had come to expect the worst, that things always seemed to break badly for them.
Dave Molinari (42:20):
He convinced that organization that good things were going to happen, and then he helped to make them happen. He's certainly one of the most important figures in franchise history in that regard.
Todd Jones (42:35):
Well, I'm glad you talked here about Badger Bob, because I do feel like sometimes a coach like that over time gets a little lost in history. What an incredible year that was in 1991, a span of months, the highs and the lows.
Todd Jones (42:50):
In March of '91, the Penguins made that huge blockbuster trade with the Hartford Whalers that brought over Francis and others.
Todd Jones (42:57):
A few months later in May, they win their first Stanley Cup under Bob Johnson. First time the franchise had ever won the Cup. They beat the Minnesota North Stars. And then only a few months later, in November of '91, November 26 Bob Johnson died of brain cancer.
Todd Jones (43:16):
All of that in a span of a few months. And you're the beat reporter going at it day to day. That must be a year that you reflect on from time to time.
Dave Molinari (43:26):
Yeah, I mean, it was extraordinary. And Bob Johnson was actually working with Team USA in Pittsburgh at that time. They were preparing for an international competition when he was rushed to the hospital with what proved to be the malignant brain tumors.
Dave Molinari (43:53):
And yeah, I mean, that was certainly not something you see coming with anybody, but to see him stricken like that at a time when he had to be riding one of the real highs in his life.
Dave Molinari (44:15):
He had some really good moments in Calgary and certainly at the University of Wisconsin where he had an absolutely ferocious rivalry with Herb Brooks when Herbie was at Minnesota.
Dave Molinari (44:33):
I mean, they were certainly not the best of friends. That was a really fierce rivalry between those teams and those guys.
Dave Molinari (44:46):
But winning a Stanley Cup and leading a US team into a major international competition, it's hard to imagine anything better happening on a professional level for Badger. And then to be stricken that way was just awful.
Dave Molinari (45:09):
And I still remember the memorial service they had for him at the arena the day he died. It was extremely moving. For a guy who was not in Pittsburgh for very long, he was certainly beloved there. And really still is to this day especially by people who were around then.
Dave Molinari (45:41):
I guess it's possible that he had a detractor somewhere in Western Pennsylvania, but it's not anybody that I ever met.
Todd Jones (45:52):
Well, Badger Bob certainly turned it around for the Pittsburgh franchise led by Mario Lemieux and Jagr on the ice also. And other guys that you mentioned. They win the Cup, Bob dies, and Scotty Bowman takes over and they win the cup again. And then that becomes the standard there.
Todd Jones (46:16):
And so much of that is tied to Mario Lemieux, one of the all-time great players and probably ... Well, you tell us, tell us about how Lemieux has become over the years in the city of Pittsburgh. The guy literally saved the franchise a couple times.
Dave Molinari (46:33):
I was going to say he did it twice. First as a player, and then as an owner. You could probably make the case that he's the most beloved sports figure in this city's history which-
Todd Jones (46:53):
Oh, wow. That says a lot when you got Roberto Clemente.
Dave Molinari (46:53):
... for a hockey player to attain that status before Lemieux arrived, it would've been unthinkable. And certainly, the Steelers with winning six Super Bowls had epic figures on the field and in the front office, Art Rooney as an owner, all of the Hall of Fame players they've had over the years.
Dave Molinari (47:28):
And people like Roberto Clemente and Willie Stargell and just back when the Pirates were a good franchise.
Dave Molinari (47:42):
You have to go back ways to get to that, but there was a time where they were one of the better franchises in Major League baseball, and they certainly produced their share of beloved figures in this area.
Dave Molinari (47:58):
But given the impact that Lemieux had on the hockey franchise as I say, both as a player and then as an owner, winning two cups as a player, three as an owner, numerous scoring championships and MVP.
Dave Molinari (48:24):
I mean, he probably had to put a wing on his house just to display all the trophies that he wanted over the course of his career.
Dave Molinari (48:35):
Honestly, if we were to have a round table debate of the most beloved sports figure in Pittsburgh history, I would be happy to be the one selected to argue on Lemieux's behalf.
Todd Jones (48:50):
Well, you mentioned all the things he did for the franchise, and besides the things he did on the ice as a player, I mean, the heroic thing, he comes back from Hodgkin's disease. And then he later comes back out of retirement to play again as an owner. And when he was already in the Hall of Fame, he did these things that like heroic type things.
Dave Molinari (49:15):
Yeah. Well, let's not overstate the whole Hodgkin's thing because the night he got his last treatment and flew across the state to play in a game, he only had two points that night. So, let's not make it sound like any big deal.
Dave Molinari (49:34):
And just because he missed, I forget how many games it was while he was being treated for Hodgkin's Disease. And when he came back, he was, I don't know, 50 points behind Pat LaFontaine in the scoring race. And he overtook him and beat him by about 50. Is that really such a big deal?
Dave Molinari (49:57):
You really do have to wonder what he could have accomplished if he had been healthy for an entire career. Now, a lot of his issues early in his career, he brought on himself. His back problem. I mean, there's nothing he could have done that I know of that could have prevented his cancer.
Dave Molinari (50:28):
But he was dogged through the early part of his career by back issues that I think could have been limited, if not completely eliminated if he had taken conditioning a little more seriously.
Dave Molinari (50:47):
The problem is he was so talented that he could get by and dominate just on ability. He didn't have to be as well conditioned and take fitness as seriously as even very good players had to.
Dave Molinari (51:04):
And I think that might well have been responsible for at least some of the issues that caused him a lot of points and a lot of playing time.
Dave Molinari (51:18):
I mean, I remember when a back issue finally forced him out of a game. I believe it was in the second period of a game at Madison Square Garden where he finally had to leave the game because he literally could not move on the ice anymore. He was effectively a statue.
Dave Molinari (51:41):
And he then left the lineup and went to California for a couple of months to be treated for that. But that ended a 45-game point streak for him. Which was six shy of the NHL record.
Dave Molinari (52:00):
And he was doing all this with a back that would've immobilized most people for weeks. It's ridiculous how gifted he was.
Dave Molinari (52:15):
And it's funny, when he made his comeback in 2000 after three years of being strictly an owner, he really did take conditioning seriously. And it became a running joke in Pittsburgh that every season that followed that he was in the best shape of his life.
Dave Molinari (52:36):
But that actually was the case because starting in 2000 when he worked very hard off the ice or and on the ice to get ready for his comeback, he didn't let up until he reached the end of his playing career.
Dave Molinari (52:54):
And so, every year he put a little more on that foundation of good conditioning. And had he done that when he was a teenager, he might still be playing and putting up two points a game.
Todd Jones (53:05):
He'd be like Jagr.
Dave Molinari (53:07):
He was just that good, that talented. I mean, 6'4", had an incredible wingspan, extraordinary instincts for the game. He was the complete package. He had everything except good health. And like I say, I suspect he was at least partly culpable for that.
Todd Jones (53:36):
You mentioned he had a seven-point night in the playoffs one night. Do you have a favorite memory? And again, you're not a fan, you're a journalist, but is there a favorite memory of Lemieux's playing career that you recall being there to chronicle?
Dave Molinari (53:52):
Strangely enough, I saw him ... my ability to describe what I see is limited at best, but he really taxed those limits with some of the things he did.
Dave Molinari (54:12):
And maybe the goal that stands out most to me is not the one in the Stanley Cup final against Minnesota that still gets a lot of attention. Where he went between Shawn Chambers and Neil Wilkinson, the Minnesota defensemen, who were unfortunate enough to be out against him at that time and beat Jon Casey with just an extraordinary goal.
Dave Molinari (54:39):
But it's a goal that he scored at Le Colisee in Quebec, where he carried a Nordiques forward named Marc Fortier on his back from the blue line to the net, and then scored. For whatever reason, if I had to cite one most enduring memory of a Lemieux goal, that would be it. Because it was just so ridiculous.
Todd Jones (55:12):
It's like he had a saddle for the guy.
Dave Molinari (55:16):
And I really felt sorry for Fortier. I'm not sure what more he could have done.
Todd Jones (55:40):
What was Lemieux like to deal with on a day-to-day basis, especially when he was a player?
Dave Molinari (55:45):
Very bland. The only time that he was particularly quotable was when he was angry about something. Occasionally, that would be in a contract negotiation.
Dave Molinari (56:05):
Or I remember probably the most famous quote associated with him was after a particularly poorly officiated game at the Capitol Center in Landover, Maryland where Lemieux labeled the NHLA Garage League because of the poor officiating in it.
Dave Molinari (56:34):
And that phrase, in fact, it's kind of found its way into the hockey lexicon. It's not solely associated with him anymore.
Dave Molinari (56:44):
But like I say, in general, he was pretty guarded. He's a very private guy. He never sought the spotlight. And when he was in it, he was generally happy to get out of it as quickly as possible. But so, no, he was not ...
Dave Molinari (57:08):
If you went to him to interview him after a game, it was probably because he had done some extraordinary things that simply couldn't be ignored, and you couldn't just write about his teammate's perspective on them. You had to talk to him about them.
Dave Molinari (57:26):
But you had to know going in that you weren't going to get anything terribly quotable from him. And he had to know, as he saw writer's approach, that he wasn't going to give them anything terribly quotable.
Todd Jones (57:40):
Not that he was obligated. Hey, I'm just here to entertain.
Dave Molinari (57:45):
There weren't many crowds that he didn't give their money's worth over the years.
Todd Jones (57:52):
Certainly, certainly. Well, your first year on the beat in 1983, '84, you mentioned anger and Lou Angotti was a little off, I believe-
Dave Molinari (58:03):
At Bobby Butera.
Todd Jones (58:06):
Yeah, let's set the stage here, because Pittsburgh, this is the year before Lemieux is eligible for the draft. The Penguins and the New Jersey Devils are basically battling it out to the bottom of the league. And late in the year, Bob Butera from the Devils accused the Penguins of what?
Dave Molinari (58:25):
Oh, and Bob Butera was completely correct. He accused the Penguins of tanking.
Todd Jones (58:33):
He was correct.
Dave Molinari (58:36):
Yeah. I mean, there had been a point fairly late in the season at which the Devils seemingly had an insurmountable three-point disadvantage against the Penguins.
Dave Molinari (58:51):
It seemed like there was no way that New Jersey could ever possibly finish ahead of Pittsburgh, because the Devils were a truly bad team then.
Dave Molinari (59:02):
But they did not have the commitment to finishing last, the Pittsburgh did. And Bob Butera went to, I believe it was to the New York Post. It might've been to other media outlets in the New York metropolitan area as well. But he essentially accused the Penguins of tanking.
Dave Molinari (59:27):
Lou Angotti the morning of a game in New Jersey found out about that and was absolutely livid. Like on the verge of throwing chairs when talking about it.
Dave Molinari (59:41):
I believe I might have been the only writer he was talking to. There were the traveling contingent at times that you're consisted of me and sometimes somebody from the Post Gazette. I don't recall if they had somebody on that particular trip.
Dave Molinari (59:57):
But Lou was absolutely enraged by the accusation. I think he was in on the tank. I don't know that.
Dave Molinari (1:00:12):
But I mean, because he was given such a poor hand to work with that you could have taken Toe Blake and one of the other great coaches in hockey history, and he wasn't going to squeeze much more out of that group than Lou Angotti was able to.
Dave Molinari (1:00:30):
They finished 16-58 and six that year. And in retrospect, the biggest question is how they managed to win 16 games. That was just a truly awful group.
Dave Molinari (1:00:46):
But it did though produce my favorite statistic of my 40 plus years of covering hockey. They had a skilled center named the Mike Bullard, who scored 51 goals that year, but not one of them was a game winner.
Dave Molinari (1:01:10):
So, yeah. But yeah, poor Lou Angotti, that was his only year behind the Penguin bench. They brought in Bob Berry, who was a relatively well-regarded coach at the time to replace him for Lemieux's rookie season.
Todd Jones (1:01:53):
Well, Mario Lemieux, obviously one of the all-time great players, certainly top three argument. Top two, if you want to go there even, with Gretzky.
Todd Jones (1:02:03):
And I wonder, when you think about the Penguins franchise, how blessed the fans have been when you get Lemieux and then in 2005 the Penguins get the number one pick of the draft lottery and they select Sidney Crosby.
Todd Jones (1:02:21):
What did Crosby bring to that franchise at that time? I mean, he was gung-ho right from his rookie year, 102 points. What was it like to all of a sudden have Crosby injected into the culture there?
Dave Molinari (1:02:39):
He brought renewed hope. It had begun to fade. Lemieux was obviously winding down in his comeback. They had finished near the bottom of the standings a couple years in a row.
Dave Molinari (1:02:58):
A year earlier, they had actually finished last in the overall standings, but lost in the draft lottery, or else they likely would've ended up with Alex Ovechkin. Who went to Washington, which won the lottery. So, Pittsburgh got Evgeni Malkin as a consolation prize, which isn't the bad one.
Todd Jones (1:03:21):
Yeah, right. That's not exactly an exploding cigar.
Dave Molinari (1:03:24):
And that was a year after they had made a trade on draft day to move up to the number one spot and get Marc-Andre Fleury, who went on to have some awfully good years in Pittsburgh.
Dave Molinari (1:03:39):
But getting Crosby really invigorated the entire franchise again. It had kind of been, I don't know, lost in the wilderness. They were starting to make a little progress with having guys like Fleury and Malkin in the pipeline.
Dave Molinari (1:04:05):
You could tell that there were better times coming, but to get Crosby really turbo charged the process.
Dave Molinari (1:04:12):
Although a lot of people might not recall the Penguins missed the playoffs badly in his first season and actually fired their coach, Eddie Olczyk, who's gone on to great renowned as a broadcaster since then in December of that year.
Dave Molinari (1:04:32):
But his first season was not smooth sailing for the franchise, although he had an outstanding season. And you could tell that there might wouldn't necessarily have known that there were multiple Stanley Cups in their future, but that there were much better times ahead for them.
Todd Jones (1:05:00):
Certainly, they've won three cups with Crosby on the ice as the top center. What has he been like to cover as a player on and off the ice? Sidney Crosby?
Dave Molinari (1:05:11):
On the ice, he might be the hardest working player I've ever seen. Which is really an extraordinary thing to say about a guy who's as talented as he is. I mean, he doesn't have Lemieux level skills, but how many guys do?
Dave Molinari (1:05:34):
He's an exceptional talent and he would've been an exceptional talent if he just had a normal work ethic.
Dave Molinari (1:05:44):
But he has a remarkable one, and it has helped him to get to what I think is a top five in NHL history level, which I do not think he would've reached on innate ability alone. He might've been top 10, certainly would've been top 15. But I think the work ethic is what has made him so good.
Dave Molinari (1:06:14):
And it hasn't eased up at all. I mean, he's been incredible to this point in 2023, '24. One of the weaknesses, relatively speaking, in his game for a lot of years was his face-offs.
Dave Molinari (1:06:39):
And he's continued to work at that, to the point where this year, I believe he's taking more face-offs than anyone in the league, and has lifted Pittsburgh into the number one spot in the NHL Face-off success rate, which is completely alien territory for them. And it's very much due to the work that Crosby has put in.
Dave Molinari (1:07:06):
Off the ice, he's always been extremely accommodating, especially in his first decade or so when he recognized the responsibility that he had as one of the faces of the league, whether he wanted to be or not.
Dave Molinari (1:07:26):
I think that much like Lemieux, he would've been quite content to operate outside the spotlight. But unlike Lemieux, he recognized that people were interested in his thought on just about any subject, whether it was related to hockey or any popular culture or anything else that anyone could think to ask.
Dave Molinari (1:07:51):
And he would sit there literally after every practice and every game and field questions generally until people were done asking. He had infinitely more patience dealing with us than I would've had.
Todd Jones (1:08:08):
Well, I think he recognized too. I mean, he comes in a year after the lockout wiped out the NHL 2004 and '05 season.
Todd Jones (1:08:16):
And for a young guy to realize that all this attention is on him, it's almost like he felt maybe an obligation to take on that role, even as a young player, just because the league needed some good pub.
Dave Molinari (1:08:29):
Oh, absolutely. That's why I said he recognized that he had been anointed the face of the league, along with I think to a slightly lesser degree, Alex Ovechkin.
Dave Molinari (1:08:41):
Perhaps because Lemieux was Crosby's teammate for at least a few months after Crosby entered the league. And that was a pretty dynamic tandem for the league to put a spotlight on.
Dave Molinari (1:08:59):
But no, he recognized his importance to the league. I mean, you would never know it from the way he talked about himself, but he was so willing to accommodate people to talk about the game and the Penguins, and to the extent that you could twist his arm to himself.
Dave Molinari (1:09:21):
It was clear that was not a reflection of his personality, that he was doing that because he felt that he had an obligation to do so.
Todd Jones (1:09:33):
And like you said, he's still working at the game at ...what is he, 36 now? 37, 36.
Dave Molinari (1:09:48):
Yeah.
Todd Jones (1:09:50):
And to continue to push and push and push. And I think that's what makes the great ones great. Right?
Dave Molinari (1:10:05):
Yeah, yeah. It makes me feel guilty when I see the work ethic that he has, and then I put it alongside mine and-
Todd Jones (1:10:15):
No, wait a minute.
Dave Molinari (1:10:16):
... I feel like a welfare fraud.
Todd Jones (1:10:18):
Wait a minute, because I'm going to close here by saying the work ethic of somebody who covers hockey, and as somebody who's done it like you have at a Hall of Fame level since 1983, that makes me feel pretty weak. That makes me feel like I'm just sleeping in.
Todd Jones (1:10:37):
But I really do admire the career that you've had covering hockey. You continue to do it at such a great level for Pittsburgh Hockey now.
Todd Jones (1:10:49):
And I know the fans are lucky to have you in Pittsburgh to chronicle all these years of great Penguins, Mario Lemieux, Jagr, Crosby, Malkin, all the cups.
Todd Jones (1:11:02):
But also, the behind the scenes stories and some of those that you shared with us today reflect what it's like to be on a beat with a team day after day, year after year.
Dave Molinari (1:11:13):
Well, I appreciate the kind words. I'm not sure that I agree with the sentiment, but I do appreciate them.
Todd Jones
Well, Dave, thanks a lot for your time. I know you're busy and we're going to let you get back to the rink.
Dave Molinari (1:11:36):
Thanks, Todd. You take care.
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