Crosby Protected From An Early Age

from Sean Gordon of the Globe and Mail, Tonight the Stanley Cup Champeens are in town for the last of a brutal five-games-in-five-nights stretch, and looks like Sidney Crosby will play against his childhood favourites. It would be interesting if Jacques Martin decides to throw Eric Neilson into the fray. Fredericton’s Fists of Fury seems to have self-detaching gloves, which leaped off his hands three times against the Sens last Friday, and again in Saturday’s rematch. But there’s another story-within-the-story involving Neilson. According to our friends at Radio-Canada, who have a good memory for such things, Neilson and a then-15-year-old Crosby were billeted together in Rimouski during their junior days. Neilson’s listed position on that Oceanic team, you’ll have guessed, was guy-who-makes-sure-nothing-bad-happens-to-Sid. The Semenko to his Gretzky, if you will. more