Welcome to Pittsburgh, Mr. Sykora

In an often shaky game for the home team, the Penguins managed to defeat the defending Stanley Cup champ Anaheim Ducks 5-4 in the home opener. Petr Sykora scored to goals in his home-Penguins debut. Armstrong, Malkin and Malone added the other three goals.

Fleury still looked very soft in goal and will need to start stepping it up. Sure, the defense made some mistakes, but your goalie needs to make those saves.

I thought Mark Eaton played an exceptional game defensively. Every time I looked, he was making one good play after the other.

Overall, it was a much better performance for the Pens than the previous night. Let's hope things continue moving in this direction.

Other notes:

• Attendance was 17,132. Plan on hearing that number a lot this season.
• "Cotton Eye Joe" won the text message vote with 80 percent of the vote. Their were some boos, but this song is part of the Pens hockey experience to me. If they want a different song to win, maybe they should mix it up a little. The three choices at the past three games have been the same.
• Sidney Crosby smartly called soft drinks "pop" to the delight of the crowd during an in-game Jumbotron feature called the Pizza Hut Hot Seat or something like that.