CRANBERRY, Pa. -- Six days after leaving the ice in the middle of the Penguins' first training camp scrimmage, Sidney Crosby rejoined his teammates for practice at the UPMC Lemieux Complex on Friday.
"It's great to have him back on the ice," assistant coach Jacques Martin said after practice. "You know how important he is to our hockey club. He brings great leadership on the ice as well as off the ice. You know how (Mike Sullivan) likes to use him in so many instances. He's a catalyst."
Crosby skated on the Lemieux Complex's second sheet of ice before practice with Casey DeSmith, then stepped on the ice just after practice began on the main rink to loud stick taps from his teammates:
The stick taps are because Sidney Crosby just joined the Penguins for practice after skating on his own on the other rink. #Pens #DKPS pic.twitter.com/D7w6Idq4ko
— Taylor Haase (@TaylorHaasePGH) July 24, 2020
"Everybody started clapping," Kris Letang said of Crosby's return to the ice. "It's always a good sign and a relief when you see your top player, one of your top players step on the ice and participate in the practice with us."
Jared McCann joked afterward that the reason for the exaggerated stick taps was that Crosby's arrival came a little after the whistle to start practice.
"We thought he was a little late for practice," McCann laughed. "But he was just on the other side (bag skating) with our skills coach. We let him know that we were happy to have him back."
MORE FROM PRACTICE
• Crosby didn't speak to the media today, but he will speak tomorrow. Martin spoke in place of Sullivan today.
• The lines were back to normal with Crosby back:
Jake Guentzel -- Sidney Crosby -- Conor Sheary
Jason Zucker -- Evgeni Malkin -- Bryan Rust
Patrick Marleau -- Jared McCann -- Patric Hornqvist
Zach Aston-Reese -- Teddy Blueger -- Brandon Tanev
Sam Lafferty, Evan Rodrigues
Brian Dumoulin -- Kris Letang
Marcus Pettersson -- John Marino
Jack Johnson -- Justin Schultz
Juuso Riikola -- Chad Ruhwedel
• The power play work was just the power play unit with no penalty killers. Drills began with Kris Letang, Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Jake Guentzel, and Bryan Rust, with Patric Hornqvist taking some shifts in Rust's place and Justin Schultz rotating in for Letang. This is the first we've seen Rust work with the top power play unit in camp.
• They also worked on some 6-on-5 drills for situations where they'd be pulling the goaltender. The group of six was Crosby, Letang, Malkin, Guentzel, Rust, and Hornqvist.
• I thought this was funny, guys were celebrating hard after every goal scored at the end of practice:
• The Black Aces skated afterward, and we were able to watch some of their practice while waiting for Martin to speak. Emil Larmi worked on some trickshots before practice. I can't speak for practices in Wilkes-Barre, but he's done this at the beginning of every practice I've seen in this camp, as well as the other training camp in the beginning of the year. He likes to have fun:
• Martin said the plan for the final scrimmage on Saturday is to have Matt Murray and Tristan Jarry play the full game, which means the Black Aces won't see any scrimmage time.
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