Michel Therrien Signs Extension

The Pittsburgh Penguins have signed head coach Michel Therrien to an extension that should see him behind the bench through the 08-09 season. After taking the reigns from Ed Olcyzk following a dismal start to the 05-06 season, Therrien allowed the Pens to finish that dismal start and decided to start fresh in 06-07.

Therrien helped guided the Penguins through an excellent 06-07 season where they essentially reversed their win/loss totals and found themselves in the playoffs for the first time since '01. The first-round of the playoffs exposed the inexperience level of the team and they got bounced by the Stanley Cup finalist Ottawa Senators in 5 games.

Some may argue that the injection of super-rookies Evgeni Malkin and Jordan Staal along with continued improvement from other young guns such as Ryan Whitney, Sidney Crosby and Marc-Andre Fleury were a bigger contributer than Therrien. Along with veterans such as Mark Recchi and Gary Roberts around along with Sergei Gonchar, who did some conversion services for Evgeni Malkin, the Pens had a good lineup of young guns, old stars and grit players.

There were also rumblings that Therrien was holding Crosby down a bit by refusing to play him late in games when it really mattered and giving him less ice-time than you'd expect. However it's always easy to blame the coach for any ill that is seen on the ice and I'm reluctant to do so.

This is pretty much the last piece for the Penguins to getting a mini-dynasty going on and, though I'm not a Penguins fan, I'm excited to see what they can do next season.