text: PressReader - Regina Leader-Post: 2017-11-15 - Crosby's mini-slump no big deal
  Crosby's mini-slump no big deal
  Regina Leader-Post - 2017-11-15 - FRONT PAGE - MICHAEL TRAIKOS mtraikos@post­media.com twit­ter.com/Michael_Traikos
  Head­ing into Tues­day's game against the Buf­falo Sabres, Crosby had no goals, three as­sists and a mi­nus-9 rat­ing in his pre­vi­ous 11 games. Dur­ing that span, the Pen­guins went 4-5-2. We're far from be­ing at a point where head coach Mike Sul­li­van's job is in jeop­ardy, but Crosby is also a far cry from the 15 goals he had in his first 17 games last sea­son, when he won the Rocket Richard Tro­phy and fin­ished sec­ond in scor­ing.
  "Peo­ple are re­ally ques­tion­ing that? I guess that last 24 months of dom­i­nance don't re­ally add up to much," Shero said with a laugh. "I don't know how many games he's gone with­out a goal, but I don't want to be that next team that play against him, I'll
  The 30-year-old started the year with five goals and five as­sists in his first eight games be­fore this slump. In other words, wait a cou­ple of more days be­fore drop­ping him from your fan­tasy league team.
  The fact he only has five goals and 13 points in his first 19 games can be chalked up to puck luck more than any­thing. Crosby, who is in the top 15 in to­tal shots, has a shoot­ing per­cent­age of 8.3 per cent — nearly half of what it was last sea­son. Dur­ing this 10-game slump, he fired 34 shots on net, in­clud­ing a seven-shot out­burst against the Win­nipeg Jets and five-shot flur­ries against the Ed­mon­ton Oil­ers and Nashville Preda­tors. The chances are com­ing, the puck just isn't go­ing in.
  Crosby, who has mostly played with Jake Guentzel (five as­sists) and Conor Sheary (two as­sists), is prac­ti­cally by him­self. He's never had top-line wingers be­cause he's never needed them. He turned Chris Ku­nitz into an Olympian, made Pas­cal Dupuis into a house­hold name and in­tro­duced the hockey world to Guentzel in last year's play­offs.