title: Kirsty MacColl

text: MacColl continues to receive media exposure; in 2004, "Kirsty MacColl: The One and Only," a biography of MacColl written by Karen O'Brien, was published. A retrospective three-CD set spanning her full career, "," was released in 2005. "Titanic Days" was re-released in 2005 as a deluxe 2-CD set, and "Kite" and "Electric Landlady" were also remastered and rereleased with additional tracks. Her first album, "Desperate Character," was given its first CD issue in 2012 on the Salvo label. On 7 August 2005, "The Best of Kirsty MacColl", a single-disc compilation that included a "new" single, "Sun on the Water", made its debut on the UK album charts at number 17, climbing to No. 12 a week later.


title: Kirsty MacColl

text: MacColl's collaboration with the Pogues, "Fairytale of New York", remains a perennial Christmas favourite. In 2004, 2005 and 2006, it was voted favourite Christmas song in a poll by music video channel VH1. The song was re-released in the UK in December 2005, with proceeds being split between the Justice for Kirsty Campaign and charities for the homeless. The re-release reached number 3 on the UK charts, and spent five weeks in the top 75 over the Christmas and New Year period. It reached the top 10 for the third time in its history in 2006, peaking at number 6, and charted yet again in December 2007. The song has also made the Top 20 in subsequent years, and has now spent more time in the top 20 than any other song. With the exception of the 2005 and 2012 re-releases, the seasonal re-charting in the 21st century is due to download sales, and not due to further releases (download sales counting toward the singles chart since 2005). A 7" single was produced in 2012 to mark the 25th anniversary of its original appearance (Rhino Records WEA400), backed with an instrumental version.


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves is a 1991 American action adventure film based on the English folk tale of Robin Hood that originated in the 12th century. It was directed by Kevin Reynolds and stars Kevin Costner as Robin Hood, Morgan Freeman as Azeem, Christian Slater as Will Scarlett, Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio as Marian, and Alan Rickman as the Sheriff of Nottingham. The screenplay was written by Pen Densham and John Watson.


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: The film received mixed reviews from critics, who praised Freeman's and Rickman's performances and the music, but criticized Costner's performance, the screenplay, and the overall execution. Nevertheless, it was a box office success, grossing more than $390 million worldwide, making it the second-highest-grossing film of 1991. Rickman received the BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role for his performance as George, Sheriff of Nottingham. The theme song "(Everything I Do) I Do It for You" by Bryan Adams was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Song, and it won the Grammy Award for Best Song Written for Visual Media.


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: In 1194, at the end of the Third Crusade, Richard the Lionheart, King of England is visiting France. This leaves the cruel Sheriff of Nottingham—aided by his cousin Guy of Gisbourne, the evil witch Mortianna, and the corrupt Bishop of Hereford—to rule the land. The Lord of Locksley Castle is killed by the Sheriff's men for remaining loyal to King Richard and refusing to join their gang. His lost son, Robin of Locksley, had followed the king's Crusade and spent five years in an Ayyubid prison in Jerusalem.


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: Robin and his comrade, Peter Dubois, break out of prison, saving the life of a Moor, named Azeem. Mortally-wounded, Peter makes Robin swear to protect his sister, Marian, and distracts the pursuers so Robin can escape. Robin returns to England with Azeem, who has vowed to accompany him until his life-debt is repaid. After a run-in with Gisbourne, Robin goes home and finds his father's rotted corpse on display in the ruined castle. Duncan, an old family retainer blinded by Gisbourne, tells him how his father was falsely accused of devil worship. The Sheriff consults Mortianna, who foresees King Richard's return and panics that Robin and Azeem "will be our deaths".


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: Robin tells his childhood friend Marian of her brother Peter's death and his promise, but Marian, remembering Robin as an arrogant bully, sees little need for his protection and is determined to stay and look after the people on her demesne. They flee the Sheriff's forces to hide in Sherwood Forest and encounter an outlaw band also in hiding. Their leader, Little John, challenges Robin to a duel which Robin wins after some difficulty. Will Scarlet, one of the bandits, holds a grudge against Robin and protests when Robin assumes command of the outlaws. Robin shapes the group into a formidable force against Nottingham. They rob rich folk passing through the forest and distribute the stolen wealth and food among the poor. Friar Tuck joins them once he understands their cause. Marian offers Robin any aid she can, and they begin to fall in love.


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: Robin's successes infuriate the Sheriff, who worsens his abuse of the public, but which increases their support for Robin. The Sheriff kills Gisbourne for failing to stop the outlaws. Seeking Mortianna's advice once more, she recommends he recruit Celtic warriors. The Bishop betrays Marian after she gives him a message warning King Richard of Nottingham's plots, and she is taken prisoner. Duncan rides to Sherwood, but is followed. The Sheriff storms and burns the outlaws' hideout, capturing many with Robin presumed dead. To consolidate his power and claim the throne, the Sheriff proposes marriage to Marian (who is Richard's cousin), claiming that, if she accepts, he will spare the lives of the woodsmen and their families, specifically the children caught during the attack. As well as her Lady-in-waiting. Marian reluctantly agrees, but the captured ringleaders, according to Nottingham are to be hanged anyway as part of the wedding celebration.


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: Will bargains with the Sheriff that he will find out if Robin is alive and kill him. Will informs Robin, Azeem, John, and a few other survivors of the Sheriff's plans, but does not trust Robin. Will reveals that the reason for his animosity toward Robin is because he is actually Robin's half-brother; after Robin's mother died, his father had taken comfort with Will's mother, a peasant woman. Robin's anger over what he saw as a betrayal of his mother's memory caused his father to leave Will's mother, leaving Will fatherless. Robin is overjoyed to learn that he has a brother, and they reconcile.


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: On the wedding day, Robin and his men infiltrate Nottingham Castle and free the prisoners. Azeem inspires the Nottingham peasants to revolt, forcing the Sheriff to retreat with Marian into his keep. The Bishop performs the marriage, and the Sheriff is about to consummate it when Robin bursts in. Friar Tuck finds the Bishop fleeing with bags of gold, and burdens him with additional treasure before defenestrating him. In a fierce fight Robin kills the Sheriff and Azeem kills Mortianna in defense of Robin, fulfilling his life-debt leaving Robin and Marian to profess their love for one another.


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: Later at Robin and Marian's wedding in Sherwood, just before Friar Tuck pronounces them husband and wife they are briefly interrupted by the return of King Richard, who gives the bride away and thanks Robin for saving his throne.


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: In August 1989, British writer-producer Pen Densham broke with the traditional account of Robin Hood as a devil-may-care adventurer, best embodied by Errol Flynn in "The Adventures of Robin Hood" in 1938. He instead reimagined Robin as a rich kid transformed into a socially conscious rebel by imprisonment in Jerusalem during the Crusades. He wrote a 92-page outline, which was then rewritten as a screenplay by his producing partner, John Watson. On February 14, 1990, Morgan Creek, the small production company of "Young Guns" (1988) and "Major League" (1989), saw "gold on the page" and immediately funded the film. Watson scouted filming locations in the United Kingdom, setting September 3 as the filming deadline in aggressive competition against other potential "Robin Hood" remakes from Twentieth Century Fox (Morgan Creek's former distribution partner) and Tri-Star Pictures.


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: Kevin Reynolds had directed Kevin Costner extensively in the past, including the challenging buffalo hunt scene of "Dances with Wolves". Reynolds said: "I'd done two pictures that hadn't made a dime, so I kind of knew [the studio] wanted me [for "Robin Hood"] because of my connections with Kevin." Indeed, Costner had already rejected the script until hearing that Reynolds was directing: "I felt Kevin was such a good filmmaker I would do it".


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: Reynolds said, "what I did not want to do was "Indiana Jones". That has been done already". Costner wanted an accent, but Reynolds thought it would distract audiences, and their indecision resulted in a drastically uneven delivery between each scene. "EW" reported, "Even before it was finished, Costner was the subject of embarrassing rumors that his performance was too laid-back and his accent more LA than UK."


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: For the role of King Richard, comedian John Cleese was proposed but Sean Connery was selected at the passionate behest of Costner and Densham. Fearing that the sudden cameo of a notorious comedic icon would destroy the drama, Densham recalls, "I so wanted to not have the John Cleese that I said, 'Would you give me Sean Connery? We can't give him a credit because you can't have the audience waiting for the whole movie to see him — but he only has to work one day." His requested $1 million fee was negotiated down to $250,000 and paid to a hospital in Connery's native Scotland as charitable compromise for making film history with the already over-budget project.


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: In 2015, Alan Rickman admitted he had secretly asked his scriptwriter friends Ruby Wax and Peter Barnes to punch up the script: "Will you have a look at this script because it's terrible, and I need some good lines." Reynolds added their lines.


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: Costner's explosive career gave him only a few days between the long-term epic projects of "Dances with Wolves", "Robin Hood", and "JFK". This project's timeframe was compressed by the cold seasons in England and by competition with other possible "Robin Hood" films, giving Reynolds only 10 weeks for preproduction and little time for planning, rehearsal, or revision. Costner said, "It's very dangerous to be [working] so fast. We are relying on the weather, and every time the weather turns against us we could get behind. When that happens there is always the feeling that certain people want to do something about it to shorten the filming time. That is not always the cure." Reynolds said, "Are things going as planned? Ha! You always start with a picture in your mind, and it is a compromise all the way from there. We have been struggling from Day One. We are trying to finish by Christmas, and the days are getting shorter. It's horrible." On the first day of filming, the suddenly changing weather caused jet traffic to be diverted from London's Heathrow Airport away, and roar over the filming location at the Burnham Beeches.


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: Principal exteriors were shot on location in the United Kingdom. A second unit filmed the medieval walls and towers of the Cité de Carcassonne in the town of Carcassonne in Aude, France, for the portrayal of Nottingham and its castle. Locksley Castle was Wardour Castle in Wiltshire—restored in an early shot using a matte painting. Marian's manor was filmed at Hulne Priory in Northumberland. Scenes set in Sherwood Forest were filmed at various locations in England: the outlaws' encampment was filmed at Burnham Beeches in Buckinghamshire, south of the real Sherwood Forest in Nottinghamshire; the fight scene between Robin and Little John was at Aysgarth Falls in North Yorkshire; and Marian sees Robin bathing at Hardraw Force, also in North Yorkshire. Sycamore Gap on Hadrian's Wall in Northumberland was used for the scene when Robin first confronts the sheriff's men. Chalk cliffs at Seven Sisters, Sussex were used as the locale for Robin's return to England from the Crusades.


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: Furious at the studio's repeated demands for yet another heavy editing session just to boost Costner's presence and prevent Rickman's performance from stealing the movieand at the studio locking his own editor out of the cutting roomReynolds walked out of the project weeks before theatrical debut. He did not attend the screening.


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: A 155-minute Extended Version of the film was released as a 2-disc Special Edition on DVD on June 10, 2003. The 2003 cut adds 12 minutes of previously unreleased footage, which details the conspirators' plot to steal the throne from King Richard, and further explores the relationship between the Sheriff and Mortianna. In one scene, Mortianna explains that she killed the true George Nottingham as a baby and replaced him with her own infant son, revealing that she is the Sheriff's real mother. In another scene, Mortianna accuses the Sheriff's scribe (John Tordoff) of being disloyal, and suggests the Sheriff remove the scribe's tongue. A subsequent added scene shows the now-tongueless scribe forced to communicate via chalkboard. This creates a continuity error with a later scene that is retained from the theatrical cut, in which the scribe easily provides spoken directions to Robin and Azeem as they rescue Marian.


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: The film was released in the United States and Canada on June 14, 1991, in 2,369 theaters and a record 3,175 screens.


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: "Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves" was submitted for classification from the British Board of Film Classification, which required fourteen seconds to be cut from the film to obtain a PG rating.


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: The original theatrical cut of the film was released on VHS in the US on October 30, 1991, and on DVD on September 30, 1997. A 2-disc special-edition DVD was released in the US on June 10, 2003, containing a 155-minute-long extended version of the film. This alternate cut of the film was released on Blu-ray in the US on May 26, 2009.


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: The film grossed $25 million in its opening weekend and $18.3 million in its second. It eventually earned $390,493,908 at the global box office, making it the second-highest-grossing film of 1991, immediately behind "". It had the second-best opening to date for a non-sequel.


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: On Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 52% based on 56 reviews, with an average rating of 5.70/10. The critical consensus reads, ""Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves" brings a wonderfully villainous Alan Rickman to this oft-adapted tale, but he's robbed by big-budget bombast and a muddled screenplay." On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 51 out of 100, based on 25 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A" on an A+ to F scale.


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: "Chicago Sun-Times" critic Roger Ebert praised the performances of Freeman and Rickman, but ultimately decried the film as a whole, giving it two stars and stating, ""Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves" is a murky, unfocused, violent, and depressing version of the classic story... The most depressing thing about the movie is that children will attend it expecting to have a good time." "The New York Times" gave the film a negative review, with Vincent Canby writing that the movie is "a mess, a big, long, joyless reconstruction of the "Robin Hood" legend that comes out firmly for civil rights, feminism, religious freedom, and economic opportunity for all." The "Los Angeles Times" also found the movie unsatisfactory, criticizing Costner for not attempting an English accent, mocking Robin's afternoon walk from the White Cliffs to Nottingham via Hadrian's Wall, which is actually .


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: Desson Thomson, writing for "The Washington Post", gave a more positive review: "Fair damsels and noble sirs, you must free yourselves of these wearisome observations. This is a state-of-the-art retelling of a classic." Owen Gleiberman, of "Entertainment Weekly" also gave a positive review: "As a piece of escapism, this deluxe, action-heavy, 2-hour-and-21-minute Robin Hood gets the job done." Lanre Bakare, writing in "The Guardian", calls Rickman's Sheriff, for which he won a BAFTA, a "genuinely great performance".


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: The original music score was composed, orchestrated and conducted by Michael Kamen. In 2017, the specialty film music label Intrada Records released a two-disc CD album containing the complete score and alternates, though not the songs from Bryan Adams and Jeff Lynne. In 2020, Intrada issued a four-disc album, with the film score on the first 2 CDs; CD 3 has alternate takes and additional music, including the Morgan Creek Productions fanfare which was derived from this score; CD 4 features the assemblies used on the 1991 soundtrack album. The songs are again absent.


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: Two tie-in video games called "" were released in 1991 for the Nintendo Entertainment System and Game Boy. Developed by Sculptured Software Inc. and Bits Studios, respectively, and published by Virgin Games, Inc., they are the cover feature for the July 1991 issue of "Nintendo Power" magazine.


title: Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

text: Kenner released a toy line consisting of action figures and playsets. All but one of the figures were derived by slight modifications to Kenner's well-known Super Powers line, and Friar Tuck, the vehicles, and playsets were modified from "Star Wars: Return of the Jedi" toys.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: The Pittsburgh Penguins (colloquially known as the Pens) are a professional ice hockey team based in Pittsburgh. They compete in the National Hockey League (NHL) as a member of the Metropolitan Division of the Eastern Conference, and have played their home games at PPG Paints Arena, originally known as Consol Energy Center, since 2010. The team previously played at the Civic Arena, also known as "the Igloo". The Penguins are currently affiliated with two minor league teams – the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins of the American Hockey League (AHL) and the Wheeling Nailers of the ECHL.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: Founded during the 1967 expansion, the Penguins have qualified for six Stanley Cup Finals, winning the Stanley Cup five times—in 1991, 1992, 2009, 2016, and 2017. Along with the Edmonton Oilers, the Penguins are tied for the most Stanley Cup championships among the non-Original Six teams and sixth overall. With their Stanley Cup wins in 2016 and 2017, the Penguins became the first back-to-back champions in the salary cap era. Several of the team's former members have been inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame, including co-owner Mario Lemieux, who purchased the Penguins in 1999 and brought the club out of bankruptcy. Lemieux, Jaromir Jagr, Sidney Crosby, and Evgeni Malkin have won the Hart Memorial Trophy while playing for the franchise.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: Prior to the arrival of the Penguins, Pittsburgh had been the home of the NHL's Pittsburgh Pirates from 1925 to 1930 and of the American Hockey League's Pittsburgh Hornets franchise from 1936 to 1967 (with a short break from 1956 to 1961). In the spring of 1965, Jack McGregor, a state senator from Kittanning, Pennsylvania, began lobbying campaign contributors and community leaders to bring an NHL franchise back to Pittsburgh. The group focused on leveraging the NHL as an urban renewal tool for Pittsburgh. The senator formed a group of local investors that included H. J. Heinz Company heir H. J. Heinz III, Pittsburgh Steelers' owner Art Rooney and the Mellon family's Richard Mellon Scaife. The projected league expansion depended on securing votes from the then-current NHL owners; to ensure Pittsburgh would be selected as one of the expansion cities, McGregor enlisted Rooney to petition votes from James D. Norris, owner of the Chicago Black Hawks and his brother Bruce Norris, owner of the Detroit Red Wings. The effort was successful, and on February 8, 1966, the National Hockey League awarded an expansion team to Pittsburgh for the 1967–68 season. The Penguins paid $2.5 million ($ million today) for their entry and $750,000 ($ million today) more for start-up costs. The Civic Arena's capacity was boosted from 10,732 to 12,500 to meet the NHL requirements for expansion. The Pens also paid an indemnification bill to settle with the Detroit Red Wings, which owned the Pittsburgh Hornets franchise. The investor group named McGregor president and chief executive officer, and he represented Pittsburgh on the NHL's Board of Governors.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: A contest was held where 700 of 26,000 entries picked "Penguins" as the team's nickname, sharing its nickname with the athletic department of the newly named Youngstown State University in nearby Youngstown, Ohio. (Youngstown is part of the Penguins' territorial rights to this day, though they did briefly share them with the Cleveland Barons in the mid-970s.) Mark Peters had the winning entry (which was inspired because the team was to play in the "Igloo", the nickname of the Pittsburgh Civic Arena), a logo was chosen that had a penguin in front of a triangle, which symbolized the "Golden Triangle" of downtown Pittsburgh. The Penguins' first general manager, Jack Riley, opened the first pre-season camp for the franchise in Brantford, Ontario, on September 13, 1967, playing the franchise's first exhibition match in Brantford against the Philadelphia Flyers on September 23, 1967. Restrictive rules which kept most major talent with the existing "Original Six" teams hampered the Pens, along with the rest of the expansion teams. Beyond aging sniper Andy Bathgate, all-star defenseman Leo Boivin (who had begun his professional career with the Hornets) and New York Rangers' veteran Earl Ingarfield, a cast of former minor leaguers largely manned the first Penguins' team. Several players played for the Hornets the previous season: Bathgate, wingers Val Fonteyne and Ab McDonald, and goaltenders Hank Bassen and Joe Daley. George Sullivan was named the head coach for the club's first two seasons, and McDonald was named the team's first captain.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: On October 11, 1967, league president Clarence Campbell and McGregor jointly dropped the ceremonial first puck of the Penguins' opening home game against the Montreal Canadiens. On October 21, 1967, they became the first team from the expansion class to defeat an Original Six team, as they defeated the Chicago Black Hawks 4–2. However, the Penguins went 27–34–13 and finished in fifth place in the West Division, missing the playoffs and ending with the third-worst record in the league. The team's best player proved to be longtime Cleveland Barons AHL goaltender Les Binkley, who recorded a 2.88 goals-against average and was second in the league with six shutouts. Defensive winger Ken Schinkel won the team's sole league honor, being named to represent the Penguins in the NHL All-Star Game. Bathgate led the team in scoring with 59 points but retired at season's end. McDonald, who led the team in goals and was second in team scoring, was also gone at season's end, traded to the St. Louis Blues in exchange for center Lou Angotti.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: The next season, 1968–69 saw the team slip in the standings amid a sharp drop in form by Binkley, into sixth place and with the league's worst record. Several changes were made to improve the team, resulting in Boivin and several others being traded, and new players—including longtime future Pens star Jean Pronovost—making their debuts. No captain was named to replace McDonald; the team went with four alternate captains.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: In the 1969 draft the Penguins selected Michel Briere who, although being chosen 26th, was soon drawing comparisons to Phil Esposito and Bobby Clarke. Joining the team in November, he finished as the second-place rookie scorer in the NHL (behind Bobby Clarke) with 44 points (57th overall), and third on the Penguins. Briere placed second in Calder Memorial Trophy voting for Rookie of the Year honors behind Chicago goaltender Tony Esposito. Briere led Pittsburgh to its first NHL playoff berth since the 1928 Pirates. The Penguins defeated the Oakland Seals in a four-game sweep in the quarterfinals, with Briere scoring the series-clinching goal in overtime. In the semi-final round, defending conference champions St. Louis Blues got the best of the Penguins during six games. Briere led the team in playoff scoring, recording five goals (including three game-winners) and eight points. Tragedy struck the Penguins just days after their playoff heroics. On May 15, 1970, Briere was in a car crash in his native Quebec, suffering brain trauma and slipping into a coma from which he would never recover; he died a year later. His number 21 jersey was never reissued, remaining out of circulation until it was formally retired in 2001.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: In the 1970–71 season, the Penguins finished five games out of the playoffs with a 21–37–20 record, the fourth-worst record in the league. Pittsburgh achieved a playoff berth in 1972, only to be swept by the Chicago Black Hawks in the first round. Except for a handful of players like Ken Schinkel, Pronovost, Syl Apps Jr., Keith McCreary, agitator Bryan Watson and goaltender Les Binkley, talent was thin, but enough for the Penguins to reach the playoffs in both 1970 and 1972.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: The Penguins battled the California Golden Seals for the division cellar in 1974, when Riley was fired as general manager and replaced by Jack Button. Button obtained Steve Durbano, Ab DeMarco, Bob "Battleship" Kelly and Bob Paradise through trades. The personnel moves proved successful, and the team improved to a 28–41–9 record, although they remained nine points away from a playoff berth.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: However, in early 1975, the Penguins' creditors demanded payment of back debts, forcing the team into bankruptcy. The doors to the team's offices were padlocked, and it looked like the Penguins would fold or relocate. Around the same time, rumors began circulating that the Penguins and the California Golden Seals were to be relocated to Seattle and Denver respectively, the two cities that were to have been the sites of an expansion for the 1976–77 season. Through the intervention of a group that included former Minnesota North Stars head coach Wren Blair, the team was prevented from folding and remained in Pittsburgh, eventually being bought by shopping mall magnate Edward J. DeBartolo, Sr.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: Beginning in the mid-1970s, Pittsburgh iced some powerful offensive clubs, led by the likes of the "Century Line" of Syl Apps, Lowell MacDonald and Jean Pronovost. They nearly reached the Stanley Cup semi-finals in 1975, but were ousted from the playoffs by the New York Islanders in one of the only four best-of-seven-game series in NHL history where a team came back from being down three games to none. As the 1970s wore on, a mediocre team defense neutralized the Penguins' success beyond the regular season. Baz Bastien, a former coach and general manager of the AHL's Hornets, later became general manager. The Penguins missed the playoffs in 1977–78. Bastien traded prime draft picks for several players whose best years were already behind them, and the team would suffer in the early 1980s as a result. The decade closed with a playoff appearance in 1979 and a rousing opening series win over the Buffalo Sabres before a second-round sweep at the hands of the Boston Bruins.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: The Penguins began the 1980s by changing their team colors; in January 1980, the team switched from wearing blue and white to their present-day scheme of black and gold to honor Pittsburgh's other sports teams, the Pittsburgh Pirates and the Pittsburgh Steelers, as well as the Flag of Pittsburgh. Both the Pirates and Steelers had worn black and gold for decades, and both had enjoyed world championship seasons. The Bruins protested this color change, claiming a monopoly on black and gold, but the Penguins defended their choice stating that the NHL Pirates also used black and gold as their team colors and that black and gold were Pittsburgh's traditional sporting colors. The NHL agreed, and Pittsburgh could use black and gold. The Penguins officially debuted the black and gold uniform in a game against the St. Louis Blues at the Civic Arena on January 30, 1980. On the ice, the Penguins began the 1980s with defenseman Randy Carlyle, and prolific scorers Paul Gardner and Mike Bullard but little else.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: During the early part of the decade, the Penguins made a habit of being a tough draw for higher-seeded opponents in the playoffs. In 1980, the 13th-seeded Penguins took the Bruins to the limit in their first-round playoff series. The following season, as the 15th seed, they lost the decisive game of their first-round series in overtime to the heavily favored St. Louis Blues. Then, in the 1982 playoffs, the Penguins held a 3–1 lead late in the fifth and final game of their playoff series against the reigning champions, the New York Islanders. However, the Islanders rallied to force overtime and won the series on a goal by John Tonelli, who had tied the game before. It would be the Pens' final playoff appearance until 1989.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: The team had the league's worst record in both the 1983 and 1984 seasons. With the team suffering financial problems, it seemed the Penguins would either fold or relocate. Mario Lemieux, one of the most highly touted NHL draft picks in history, was due to be drafted in the 1984 NHL Entry Draft. Heading towards the end of the season ahead of the New Jersey Devils, who were placed last, the Penguins made several questionable moves that appeared to weaken the team in the short term. They posted three six-game winless streaks in the last 21 games of the season and earned the right to draft Lemieux amidst protests from Devils' management. Pittsburgh head coach Lou Angotti later admitted that a conscious decision was made to finish the season as the team with the worst record, saying in an interview with the "Pittsburgh Post-Gazette" that a mid-season lunch prompted the plan, because there was a high chance of the franchise folding if Lemieux was not drafted. Other teams offered substantial trade packages for the draft choice, but the Penguins kept the pick and drafted Lemieux first overall. Lemieux paid dividends right away, scoring on his first-ever shot of his first-ever NHL shift in his first NHL game. However, the team spent four more years out of the playoffs after his arrival. In the late 1980s, the Penguins finally gave Lemieux a strong supporting cast, trading for superstar defenseman Paul Coffey from the Edmonton Oilers (after the Oilers' 1987 Stanley Cup win) and bringing in young talent like scorers Kevin Stevens, Rob Brown and John Cullen from the minors. The team finally acquired a top-flight goaltender with the acquisition of Tom Barrasso from Buffalo. All this talent had an immediate impact in helping Lemieux lead the Pens; but the team struggled to make the playoffs. The 1985–86 Pens missed the playoffs on the final day of the season by one game. In 1986–87, they missed the playoffs by just two games and saw four teams with equal or worse records qualify. In 1987–88, for the second time in a row, the Penguins missed the playoffs by one game.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: In 1989, Pittsburgh finally broke through the barrier and made the playoffs on the back of Lemieux leading the league in goals, assists and points. On December 31, 1988, Lemieux became the only player in history to score a goal in all five possible game situations in the same game (even strength, shorthanded, penalty shot, power play, and empty net). The Pens shocked the New York Rangers in a four-game sweep in the first round; however, the Philadelphia Flyers halted their in the second round. The seven-game defeat featured Lemieux scoring five goals in the fifth game.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: A herniated disc in Lemieux's back cut short his 1989–90 season, although he still amassed 123 points. However, the Penguins fell out of the playoff picture. They opted to strengthen their roster and support Lemieux in the 1990 off-season. Free-agent signings (Bryan Trottier) and trades (Joe Mullen, Larry Murphy, Ron Francis and Ulf Samuelsson) played a major part in this. Arguably no move was bigger during this time than when the Penguins drafted Jaromir Jagr with the fifth overall pick in the 1990 NHL Entry Draft. The first Czechoslovak player to be drafted into the NHL without first needing to defect to the West, Jagr became the Penguins' second franchise player, and quickly developed into a superstar offensive talent.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: The roster overhaul culminated in the Penguins winning their first Stanley Cup title by defeating the Minnesota North Stars in the Stanley Cup Finals in six games, punctuated by an 8–0 victory in the deciding game, the largest margin of victory in a final Stanley Cup game in over 80 years. After the 1991 Stanley Cup Finals, the Penguins met with President George H. W. Bush, the first NHL team ever to visit the White House. The following season, the team lost coach Bob Johnson to cancer, and Scotty Bowman took over as coach. Under Bowman, they swept the Chicago Blackhawks to repeat as Stanley Cup champions in 1991–92.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: Cancer revisited the Penguins in 1993 when Lemieux was tragically diagnosed with Hodgkin lymphoma. Only two months after the diagnosis, missing 24 out of 84 games, he came back to win his fourth Art Ross Trophy as scoring champion with 160 points, edging out Pat LaFontaine and Adam Oates. Despite the off-ice difficulties, Pittsburgh finished with a 56–21–7 record, the franchise's best regular-season ever, winning the Presidents' Trophy. After Lemieux's return, the team played better than it ever had before, winning an NHL-record 17 consecutive games. Despite all of this success, the New York Islanders eliminated them in the second round of Game 7 in overtime.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: The Penguins continued to be a formidable team throughout the 1990s. The stars of the Stanley Cup years were followed by the likes of forwards: Alexei Kovalev, Martin Straka, Aleksey Morozov, Robert Lang and Petr Nedved, and defensemen Sergei Zubov, Darius Kasparaitis and Kevin Hatcher. Despite the departure of many of the franchise's Stanley Cup-winning roster, the Penguins fielded enough talent to reach the first round of the playoffs in 1994 (where they lost to the Washington Capitals in six games), the second round in 1995 (where they lost to the New Jersey Devils in five games) and the conference finals in 1996 (where they lost to the Florida Panthers in seven games). The 1997 playoffs marked a turning point, as the Penguins suffered a first-round elimination at the hands of the rival Philadelphia Flyers in five games.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: On April 6, 1997, the franchise was rocked when Mario Lemieux, citing ongoing health concerns and his disapproval with the way NHL hockey was being officiated, announced he would retire at the conclusion of the 1997 playoffs. Lemieux was so respected in the NHL, and his achievements over the course of his career were so great, that he was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in the year he retired, the three-year waiting period being waived. His departure was the first in a series of events that would once again lead the Penguins into regular season stagnation, and to the brink of financial ruin.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: The Montreal Canadiens eliminated the team in the first round of the playoffs in 1998, despite being the second-seeded team in the East. The following year, their playoff run ended in the second round when they lost to the Toronto Maple Leafs in six games. In 2000, the Penguins stunned the highly touted Washington Capitals 4–1 in the first round, only to fall to the Philadelphia Flyers 4–2 in the second round.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: By this time, the lofty contracts handed out during the early 1990s were catching up with the Penguins. At one point, the team owed over $90 million to numerous creditors, leading then-owners Howard Baldwin and Morris Belzberg (who bought the Penguins after their first Stanley Cup win) to ask the players to defer their salaries to help pay the bills. When the deferred salaries finally came due, combined with other financial pressures, the Penguins were forced to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in November 1998.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: Lemieux then stepped in with an unusual proposal to buy the team out of bankruptcy. The Penguins owed Lemieux $32.5 million in deferred salary, making him the team's largest individual creditor. He proposed recovering this money by converting it into equity—enough to give him controlling interest. He also vowed to keep the team in Pittsburgh. The NHL and the courts agreed, and Lemieux (with help from supermarket tycoon Ronald Burkle) assumed control on September 3, 1999, saving the franchise for the second time.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: Lemieux again shocked the hockey world by announcing at a press conference on December 8, 2000, his intentions to return to the Penguins as an active player. On December 27, 2000, Lemieux stepped onto NHL ice for the first time in 44 months, officially becoming the first player–owner in NHL history. Lemieux helped lead the Penguins deep into the 2001 playoffs, highlighted by an overtime victory against the Buffalo Sabres in Game 7 of the second round. Darius Kasparaitis scored the series-clinching goal to advance the Penguins to the Eastern Conference Finals, where they lost in five games to the New Jersey Devils.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: The Penguins' attendance had dwindled in the late 1990s. In 1998–99, the club had an average attendance of 14,825 at home games, the lowest it had been since Lemieux's rookie year. Reducing revenue on top of the previous bankruptcy necessitated salary shedding. The biggest salary move was the trading of superstar Jaromir Jagr to the Washington Capitals in the summer of 2001. The Penguins missed the playoffs for the first time in 12 years in 2002, finishing in a tie for third-to-last in their conference. The following season they finished second-last. In the 2003 NHL Entry Draft, the Penguins selected goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury with the first overall pick.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: The 2003–04 season was an ordeal with Lemieux missing all but 24 regular-season games with a hip injury, and attendance dipping to an average of 11,877 (the lowest average of any NHL team), with just one sellout. As the season progressed, the Penguins signed new head coach (and former Penguins' player and commentator) Eddie Olczyk and opted not to include Fleury in the lineup for the bulk of the season. This culminated in the worst record in the NHL, with the team winning just 23 games. As in the 1980s, the Penguins' struggles were fortuitously concurrent with a string of NHL Entry Draft classes that would yield multiple world-class talents. The Penguins lost out on the first overall pick for the 2004 NHL Entry Draft (Alexander Ovechkin), which went to the Washington Capitals. However, Ovechkin's countryman, center Evgeni Malkin, was similarly highly regarded, and Pittsburgh took him with the second overall pick. However, a transfer dispute between the NHL and the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) delayed his Pittsburgh debut.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: By this point, the Penguins had collapsed financially since the Stanley Cup-winning years of the early 1990s. Their home venue, the Civic Arena, had become the oldest arena in the NHL, and Lemieux had tried unsuccessfully to cut a deal with the city for a new facility. With Pittsburgh uninterested in building a new hockey arena for the struggling Penguins, Lemieux began looking into the possibilities of selling and/or relocating the team to Kansas City, Missouri. A lockout prompted the cancellation of the 2004–05 NHL season. One of the many reasons for the lockout included disagreements on resolving the financial struggles of teams like the Penguins and the Ottawa Senators, which had filed for bankruptcy protection. During the lockout, the Penguins' players dispersed between the club's American Hockey League (AHL) affiliate, the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins, and to European leagues.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: With the lockout resolved in 2005, the NHL organized an unprecedented draft lottery to set the 2005 NHL Entry Draft selection order. The draft lottery, which was held behind closed doors in a "secure location", resulted in the Penguins being awarded the first overall pick. Quebec Major Junior Hockey League (QMJHL) superstar Sidney Crosby (who had been training with Lemieux over the summer) was the consensus first overall pick, with many referring to the draft lottery process as "The Sidney Crosby Sweepstakes". The Penguins selected Crosby on July 30, 2005, with the top pick, instantly rekindling interest in hockey in Pittsburgh.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: The Penguins began rebuilding the team under the salary cap. However, Evgeni Malkin, the Penguins' 2004 draft pick, could not report to Pittsburgh immediately because of a playing rights dispute with the Russian Superleague. The addition of Crosby paid instant dividends, with attendance rising by approximately 4,000 per game on average in the 2005–06 season. However, Crosby's presence did not immediately translate into wins, as the team began the season with a long winless skid that resulted in a head coaching change from Olczyk to Michel Therrien. Then, on January 24, 2006, Lemieux announced his second retirement, after developing an irregular heartbeat, this time permanently. He finished as the NHL's seventh all-time scorer (1,723), eighth in goals (690) and tenth in assists (1,033), and with the second-highest career points per game average (1.88), which is second to Wayne Gretzky's 1.92.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: Despite the team's struggles, Crosby established himself as a star in the league, amassing 102 points in his debut season and finishing second to Alexander Ovechkin for the Calder Memorial Trophy awarded each year to the league's top rookie. In the Penguins' final game of the season, Crosby tallied a goal and an assist to become the top-scoring rookie in Penguin history (eclipsing Lemieux). The Penguins again posted the worst record in the Eastern Conference and the highest goals-against total in the League. They received the second overall draft pick, their fourth top-two pick in four years, in the 2006 NHL Entry Draft, and selected touted two-way forward Jordan Staal. The team announced on April 20 they would not renew the contract for general manager Craig Patrick, who had been the general manager since December 1989. On May 25, Ray Shero signed a five-year contract as general manager.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: Change came for the Penguins on October 18, 2006, when Evgeni Malkin made his NHL debut. He set the modern NHL record with a goal in each of his first six games. Malkin would record points in 16 consecutive games. The Penguins finished the 2006–07 season in fifth place in the Eastern Conference with a record of 47–24–11, totaling 105 points, only two points behind the Atlantic Division winners, the New Jersey Devils. It was the franchise's first 100-point season in 11 years and represented an enormous 47-point leap from the previous season. In the first round of the 2007 playoffs the eventual Stanley Cup runners-up, the Ottawa Senators, defeated the Penguins 4–1. At the season's end, rookies Malkin and Jordan Staal were finalists for the Calder Memorial Trophy, awarded to the Rookie of the Year, which Malkin won.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: On March 13, 2007, Pennsylvania's Governor Ed Rendell, Allegheny County Chief Executive Dan Onorato, Pittsburgh Mayor Luke Ravenstahl and Mario Lemieux of the Penguins ownership group announced an agreement had been reached among the parties to build the long-sought arena. The state-of-the-art, multi-purpose facility, the Consol Energy Center, guaranteed that the Penguins would remain in the city of Pittsburgh. Following the announcement of the plan, the Lemieux ownership group announced they no longer had plans to sell the team. On June 8, 2007, a $325 million bond was issued, and the Penguins signed a 30-year lease on September 19, binding them to the city of Pittsburgh through 2040.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: After a mediocre start to the 2007–08 season, Crosby and starting goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury were both injured long-term due to high right ankle sprains. In their absence, the team flourished because of the play and leadership of Malkin. On April 2, 2008, the Penguins clinched the Atlantic Division title—their first division title in 10 years—with a 4–2 win against rivals the Philadelphia Flyers. Malkin finished the season with 106 points for second place in the league and finished as a finalist for the Hart Memorial Trophy. The team launched into their first extended playoff run in many years, beating Ottawa 4–0, defeating the New York Rangers 4–1 and then defeating the Philadelphia Flyers 4–1 to clinch the Prince of Wales Trophy. Pittsburgh lost the 2008 Stanley Cup Finals to the Detroit Red Wings in six games, finishing the playoffs with a 14–6 record. Crosby finished the playoffs with 27 points (6 goals and 21 assists in 20 games), tying Conn Smythe Trophy-winner Henrik Zetterberg (13 goals and 14 assists in 22 games) for the playoff scoring lead.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: In the 2008–09 season, Malkin won the Art Ross and was again a candidate for the Hart Memorial Trophy. Crosby finished third in League scoring with 33 goals and 70 assists for 103 points, despite missing five games. The Penguins' record dipped mid-season but lifted after Dan Bylsma replaced head coach Therrien. The effect was almost instantaneous, and the Penguins recovered enough to secure home-ice advantage in their first-round match up against the Philadelphia Flyers, whom the Penguins defeated in six games. It took seven games for the Penguins to win the next series against Washington, sending them to the Eastern Conference Finals, where they eliminated the Carolina Hurricanes in a four-game sweep. After defeating the Hurricanes, the Penguins earned their second consecutive trip to the Stanley Cup Finals against the Detroit Red Wings, to whom they lost the previous year. After losing Games 1 and 2 in Detroit, like the previous years, the Penguins won Games 3 and 4 in Pittsburgh. Each team won on home ice in Games 5 and 6. In Game 7 in Detroit, Maxime Talbot scored two goals, including the game-winner, as the Penguins won 2–1 to win their third Stanley Cup title. Malkin was awarded the Conn Smythe Trophy as the MVP of the playoffs.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: During the 2009–10 season, Crosby scored 109 points (51 goals and 58 assists) in 81 games, winning the Maurice "Rocket" Richard Trophy as the NHL season's leading goalscorer. The Penguins, seeded fourth in the East, began their title defense, defeating the Ottawa Senators in six games. In the next round, the Penguins faced the Montreal Canadiens. The teams swapped wins in the series en route to the decisive Game 7, which the Penguins lost 5–2, ending their season and their tenure at Mellon Arena.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: In 2010–11, the Penguins played their first game in the Consol Energy Center. On February 11, 2011, the Pittsburgh Penguins–New York Islanders brawl took place. A season-ending concussion suffered by Crosby and a knee injury to Malkin marred the season. The team left early in the playoffs, blowing a 3–1 series lead to Tampa Bay Lightning, with Fleury's goaltending called into question. With Crosby still sidelined with post-concussion syndrome, at the start of the 2011–12 season, Malkin led the Penguins' top line and dominated league scoring. He finished with 50 goals and 109 points as the Penguins earned 51 wins on the season. With Malkin's Art Ross-winning performance, and Crosby's late-season return from injury, the Penguins headed into the 2012 playoffs with high hopes of making a significant Stanley Cup run. However, their cross-state rivals, the Philadelphia Flyers, defeated the highly favored Penguins in six games. Malkin was later awarded the Hart Memorial Trophy and Lester B. Pearson award. Following the Penguins' disappointing playoff exit, general manager Ray Shero made changes to the team at the 2012 NHL Entry Draft for the upcoming 2012–13 season.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: During the lockout-shortened 2012–13 season, the Penguins again fought through serious injury. At the end of the regular season, they finished atop the Eastern Conference, matching up against the New York Islanders in round one. The Penguins defeated the Islanders in six games, with Fleury struggling once again. The team then dispatched the Ottawa Senators in five games before being swept in the Conference Finals by the Boston Bruins, scoring just two goals in the entire four-game sweep. On June 13, 2013, Malkin signed an eight-year contract extension worth an annual average of $9.5 million.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: In the 2013–14 season, the Penguins suffered numerous injuries throughout the campaign. Despite the adversity, the Penguins won the realigned, eight-team Metropolitan Division, though the club struggled in the playoffs, requiring six games to defeat the Columbus Blue Jackets, then losing to the New York Rangers in seven games despite leading the series 3–1 after four games. This collapse prompted Penguins ownership to fire general manager Shero, replacing him on June 6 with Jim Rutherford, the former general manager of the Carolina Hurricanes. Rutherford's first action as general manager was to fire head coach Dan Bylsma, and on June 25, he announced that Mike Johnston was hired as Bylsma's replacement. In the 2014–15 season, the Penguins led the Metropolitan Division for the first half of the season. However, after losing players to injuries and illnesses, including the mumps, the team fell to fourth in the Division. The Pens lost in five games to the New York Rangers in the first round of the playoffs. In the off-season, Rutherford traded several players and picks to acquire star winger Phil Kessel.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: After acquiring Kessel, the Penguins had high expectations for the 2015–16 season. However, by December 12, 2015, the team was barely managing a winning season, posting a 15–10–3 record. The organization fired head coach Mike Johnston, and replaced him with Mike Sullivan, who had previously served as the head coach in Wilkes-Barre/Scranton. This move was followed by a series of trades by Jim Rutherford.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: The Penguins qualified for the playoffs for the tenth consecutive season. They earned second place in the Metropolitan Division with 104 points. In the playoffs, the Penguins defeated the Rangers in a 4–1 series, the Capitals 4–2 and the Lightning 4–3 to win the Eastern Conference Championship, advancing to the Stanley Cup Finals against the San Jose Sharks. On June 12, 2016, the Penguins defeated the Sharks in a 4–2 series to win their fourth Stanley Cup title. Captain Sidney Crosby was awarded the Conn Smythe Trophy.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: The Penguins opened their 50th anniversary season in the NHL as defending Stanley Cup champions, raising their commemorative banner on October 13, 2016, in a shootout victory over Washington. The Penguins faced the Columbus Blue Jackets in the opening round of the 2017 playoffs, defeating them in five games. In the second round, they played against their divisional rival, Washington, and faced them for the second-straight year in the same round, winning a seven-game series. In the Conference Finals, the Penguins eliminated the Ottawa Senators in seven games to advance to the Stanley Cup Finals, where they faced the Nashville Predators. The Penguins won the first two games of the finals and then lost the next two matchups before dominating the fifth and the sixth games of the series to win the Stanley Cup for the second straight year. By defending their title, the Penguins became the first team since the 1997–98 Detroit Red Wings to defend their title successfully and the first to do so in the salary cap era.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: Before the 2017–18 season, the Penguins lost longtime goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury in the 2017 NHL Expansion Draft to the Vegas Golden Knights. Nevertheless, the Penguins again qualified for the Stanley Cup playoffs with the second division playoff spot, finishing the regular season with 100 points. They defeated the Philadelphia Flyers in the first round in six games, but were defeated by the eventual Stanley Cup champion Washington Capitals in six games. In the next season, the Penguins clinched a playoff berth, but were swept by the New York Islanders in the First Round. In the following season, which was shortened by the COVID-19 pandemic, the team advanced to the 2020 playoffs, but were defeated by the Montreal Canadiens in the Qualifying Round. On February 9, 2021, the Penguins named Ron Hextall as their new general manager, after Jim Rutherford resigned from his post on January 27, because of personal reasons. Brian Burke was hired as president of hockey operations. On February 21, Crosby became the first player to reach 1,000 NHL games for the team. The Penguins won the East Division title, extending their playoff streak to 15 seasons. This became the longest active streak in North American sports as a result of the San Antonio Spurs missing the 2020 NBA playoffs. The 2020–21 season came to an end in Game 6 of the first round of the playoffs against the New York Islanders.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: On November 29, 2021, Fenway Sports Group announced its intent to purchase a controlling stake in the Penguins. On December 31, 2021, they officially took over as majority owners of the Penguins.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: Despite Pittsburgh's long history with hockey and a small but loyal fanbase, the Penguins struggled with fan support early on in its history, at times averaging only 6,000 fans per game when Civic Arena had a seating capacity of over 16,000. Fan support was so low by the team's first bankruptcy that the NHL had no problem with the team being moved, something that would change decades later when the team faced another relocation threat.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: While the drafting of Mario Lemieux piqued interest in hockey locally, fans remained skeptical. John Steigerwald, brother of former Penguins broadcaster Paul Steigerwald, noted in his autobiography that upon his arrival at KDKA-TV from WTAE-TV in 1985, the station cared more about the Pittsburgh Spirit of the Major Indoor Soccer League than the Penguins. However, Lemieux's play steadily grew the fanbase in the area, which would only be reassured upon the arrival of Sidney Crosby after the team struggled both on the ice and in attendance following the Jaromir Jagr trade.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: Today, the Penguins are one of the NHL's most popular teams, especially among American non-Original Six franchises, and are considered second behind the Steelers among Pittsburgh's three major professional sports teams, taking advantage of both its success and the Pittsburgh Pirates struggles both on and off the field. Especially notable was a 2007 survey done of the four major sports leagues' 122 teams. The Penguins surprised observers by being ranked 20th overall and third among NHL teams, while the Steelers were ranked number one and the Pirates (before the arrival of Andrew McCutchen and that team's turnaround) ranked much lower on the list than its peers. The Penguins' popularity has at times rivaled that of the Steelers at the local level.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: Considered by some to be the best rivalry in the NHL, the Philadelphia Flyers–Pittsburgh Penguins rivalry began in 1967 when the teams were introduced in the NHL's "Next Six" expansion wave. The rivalry exists both due to divisional alignment and geographic location, as both teams play in Pennsylvania. The Flyers lead the head-to-head record with a 153–98-30 record. However, the Penguins eliminated the Flyers from the playoffs in 2008 and 2009 and were eliminated by them from the playoffs in 2012, strengthening the rivalry. Three years later, the Flyers won the sixth playoff meeting between the clubs to advance to the Conference Semi-finals.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: The franchises have met seven times in the playoffs, with the Flyers winning four series (1989 Patrick Division Finals, 4–3; 1997 Eastern Conference Quarter-finals, 4–1; 2000 Eastern Conference Semi-finals, 4–2; and 2012 Eastern Conference Quarter-finals, 4–2) and the Penguins winning three (2008 Eastern Conference Finals, 4–1; 2009 Eastern Conference Quarterfinals, 4–2; and 2018 Eastern Conference First Round, 4–2).


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: The two teams have faced off 11 times in the playoffs, with the Penguins winning nine of the 11 matchups, their two series losses coming in the 1994 and 2018 playoffs. The Penguins defeated the Capitals en route to their five Stanley Cup victories. They have met in a decisive game 7 in the 1992, 1995, 2009 and 2017 playoffs. The NHL's fourth Winter Classic, played on January 1, 2011, at Heinz Field in Pittsburgh showcased this rivalry. The Capitals won the game 3–1. The rivalry can also be seen in the American Hockey League (AHL). Pittsburgh's top farm team is the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins, and their in-state and biggest rivals are the Capitals' top farm team, the Hershey Bears.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: When the Penguins made their NHL debut in 1967, the team wore the colors dark blue, light blue and white. The uniforms had the word "Pittsburgh" written diagonally down the front of the sweater with three dark blue stripes around the sleeves and bottom. The logo featured a hockey-playing penguin in a scarf over an inverted triangle, symbolizing the Golden Triangle of downtown Pittsburgh. A refined version of the logo appeared on a redesigned uniform in the second season, which removed the scarf and gave the penguin a sleeker look. The circle encompassing the logo was later removed.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: The team's colors were originally powder blue, navy blue, and white. The powder blue was changed to royal blue in 1973 but returned in 1977. The team adopted the current black and gold color scheme in 1980 to unify the colors of the city's professional sports teams although, like the Pittsburgh Pirates and the Steelers, the shade of gold more closely resembled yellow. The change was not without controversy, as the Boston Bruins protested by claiming to own the rights to the black and gold colors. However, the Penguins cited the colors worn by the now-defunct NHL team the Pittsburgh Pirates in the 1920s, as well as black and gold being the official colors of the City of Pittsburgh and its namesake, and obtained permission to use the black and gold colors. The NHL's Pittsburgh Pirates used old Pittsburgh Police uniforms, beginning the black and gold color tradition in the city.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: The Penguins generally wore the black and gold "skating penguin" uniform between 1980 and 1992, with a few noticeable changes in the lettering and striping. A gold alternate uniform was worn between 1980 and 1984, and briefly replaced the white uniform for home games in the 1983–84 season.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: In the 1992–93 season, the Penguins unveiled new uniforms and introduced the "flying penguin" logo, or "Robopenguin". The team's away uniforms were a throwback to the team's first season, as they revived the diagonal "Pittsburgh" script. In 1995, the team introduced their second alternate jersey, featuring different stripe designs on each sleeve. This jersey proved to be so popular that the team adopted it as their away jersey in 1997. In 2000, the Penguins brought back the "skating penguin" logo, but with a "Vegas gold" shade, upon releasing its new alternate uniform. After 2002, the "skating penguin" was readopted as the primary, though the "flying penguin" remained the alternate. A corresponding white version of the "Vegas gold" uniforms was introduced, and the 1995–2002 black uniform was retired. When the new jerseys were unveiled for the 2007–08 season league wide, the Penguins made major striping pattern changes and removed the "flying penguin" logo from the shoulders.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: The Penguins have worn their black jersey at home since the league began the initiative to do so beginning with the 2003–04 NHL season. The team wore their powder blue, 1968–1972 "throwbacks" against the Buffalo Sabres in the 2008 NHL Winter Classic. This throwback was supposedly retired with the introduction of a new dark blue third jersey that made its debut at the 2011 NHL Winter Classic. For the 2011–12 season, the 2011 Winter Classic jersey was the team's official third uniform, with the 2008 Winter Classic uniform having been retired. Called the "Blue Jerseys of Doom" by the "Pittsburgh Tribune-Review", the alternate jerseys were worn when Sidney Crosby sustained a broken jaw and when he suffered a concussion in the 2011 Winter Classic. Evgeni Malkin was also concussed during a game when the Penguins donned the alternate uniforms.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: In 2014, the Penguins released their new alternate uniforms. The new black uniforms are throwbacks to the early part of Lemieux's playing career, emulating the uniforms worn by the Penguins' 1991 and 1992 Cup-winning teams. The new alternate uniform featured "Pittsburgh gold", the particular shade of gold which had been retired when the Penguins switched to the metallic gold full-time in 2002. The Penguins eventually brought back a white version of the black "Pittsburgh gold" alternates, thus retiring the "Vegas gold" uniforms they wore from 2000 to 2016. A commemorative patch was added to the uniforms throughout the 2016–17 season to celebrate the team's 50th anniversary. During the 2017 NHL Stadium Series against the archrival Philadelphia Flyers, the Penguins wore a special gold uniform featuring military-inspired lettering, a "City of Champions" patch and a variation of the "skating penguin" logo. This design served as the basis for the team's third uniform, which was unveiled in the 2018–19 season and was also partly inspired by the early 1980s gold uniforms. The Penguins wore monochrome black uniforms minus the white elements when they faced the Flyers again in the 2019 NHL Stadium Series.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: In 2021, the Penguins wore white "Reverse Retro" uniforms based on the 1992–97 uniforms. This set replaced the "flying penguin" with the alternate "skating penguin" logo minus the gold triangle on the shoulders. A black version served as the replacement for the gold alternate uniforms starting in the 2021–22 season. In the 2022–23 season, the Penguins unveiled their second "Reverse Retro" uniform, this time featuring a black version of the white "flying penguin" uniform they wore from 1992 to 2002; this design is identical to a planned away jersey the Penguins planned to unveil back in 1992 but was rejected by the NHL due to the league at the time only allowing one white jersey and one team colored jersey.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: For the 2023 NHL Winter Classic, the Penguins went with a vintage white uniform with black stripes, and added a gold "P" logo as a nod to the NHL Pirates of the late 1920s.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: The Penguins currently have their radio home on WXDX-FM and their television home on AT&T SportsNet Pittsburgh. The Pittsburgh Penguins Radio Network consists of a total of 34 stations in four states. Twenty three of these are in Pennsylvania, four in West Virginia, three in Ohio, and three in Maryland. The network also features an FM high-definition station in Pittsburgh.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: Local ABC affiliate WTAE-TV broadcast the Penguins during the 1967–68 season, with station Sports Director Ed Conway handling the play-by-play during both the television and radio broadcasts. He remained the lone play-by-play broadcaster until the completion of the 1968–69 season. Joe Tucker took over for Ed Conway during the 1969–70 season, when WPGH-TV and WTAE-TV split Penguins' broadcasts. WPGH-TV retained the rights to broadcast the Penguins for the 1970–71 season, with Bill Hamilton handing the play-by-play duties. The 1970–71 season was also the first season where the Penguins introduced a color commentator to the broadcast team, with John MacDonald taking the position in the booth.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: Mike Lange, who joined the Penguins' broadcast team as a play-by-play announcer on the radio side in 1974–75 became the play-by-play broadcaster for the team at the start of the 1979–80 season. At his side was Terry Schiffauer, who had previously held the position of Penguins' director of public relations and eventually transitioned into color commentator for Sam Nover in 1972–73. Lange and Schiffauer remained a team in the Penguins' broadcast booth until 1984–85, when Schiffauer was replaced by Paul Steigerwald. Lange and Steigerwald remained a constant in the broadcast booth from 1985 until 1999.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: With Steigerwald's departure in 1999, Mike Lange shared the broadcast booth with former Penguins' defenseman Peter Taglianetti. Taglianetti remained in the position for one season before being replaced by Eddie Olczyk. Lange and Olczyk were broadcast partners from 2000 until 2003, when Olczyk left the booth to become the 18th head coach in Penguins' history following the firing of previous head coach Rick Kehoe after the 2002–03 season. With Olczyk's vacancy, the Penguins hired Bob Errey as their new color commentator for the start of the 2003–04 season. Lange and Errey remained in the booth until 2005–06. After 26 seasons in the television broadcast booth, FSN Pittsburgh did not retain Mike Lange. Instead, he was replaced by former broadcast partner Paul Steigerwald, who remained the team's TV play-by-play broadcaster until the 2016–17 season. Lange returned to the radio broadcast booth and currently holds the position of radio play-by-play announcer, the same position he held with the team in the mid-1970s. Following the 2016–17 season, Steigerwald moved back to the Penguins front office and NHL Network personality Steve Mears was hired as the new television play-by-play announcer starting with the 2017–18 season. Lange retired in the 2021 offseason, with Josh Getzoff being named as his replacement. Currently, Phil Bourque serves as the radio color commentator.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: Every Penguins game is currently carried on the AT&T SportsNet Pittsburgh network, which is carried by cable providers in most of two states and parts of four others. In addition, Fox Sports Ohio simulcasts Penguins hockey in the Cleveland metro area, as well as some parts of Eastern Ohio and Northern Kentucky. Dish Network, Verizon FiOS, and Direct TV each carry the Penguins games on their AT&T SportsNet Pittsburgh channel in HD nationally. The Pittsburgh Penguins also receive monthly and sometimes weekly "game of the week" national exposure on American networks ESPN, ESPN+, ABC, and TNT, and Canadian networks Sportsnet and CBC. Previously, the Penguins received national TV exposure on NBC and NBCSN in the U.S., and TSN in Canada.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: The Penguins called Civic Arena home for over 45 seasons from their inception in 1967. In September 2010, they completed the move to the state-of-the-art Consol Energy Center (now named the PPG Paints Arena). The Penguins also played two "home" games in the Cleveland suburb of Richfield, Ohio, in 1992 and 1993 at the Richfield Coliseum (this is not unlike the Cleveland Cavaliers of the NBA playing an annual pre-season game in Pittsburgh; the Philadelphia 76ers used the Civic Arena as a second home in the early 1970s).


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: From 1995 to 2015, the IceoPlex at Southpointe in the South Hills suburbs served as the team's practice facility. Robert Morris University's 84 Lumber Arena has served as a secondary practice facility for the team. During the franchise's first pre-season training camp and pre-season exhibition games, the Brantford Civic Centre in Brantford, Ontario, served as its home, and by the 1970s and continuing through the 1980s, the team was using the suburban Rostraver Ice Garden for training.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: In August 2015, the Penguins and the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) opened the UPMC Lemieux Sports Complex, combining a new team practice and training facility with a UPMC Sports Medicine treatment and research complex, in suburban Cranberry Township near the interchange between Interstate 79 and Pennsylvania Route 228. The twin rink facility replaced both the IceoPlex at Southpointe and the 84 Lumber Arena as the Penguins' regular practice facility, freeing up the Consol Energy Center for other events on days the Penguins are not scheduled to play.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: As with most other NHL arenas, the Penguins make use of a goal horn whenever the team scores a goal at home. It is also played just before the beginning of a home game, and after a Penguins victory. Their current goal horn made by Nathan Manufacturing, Inc. and introduced in 2005 to coincide with Sidney Crosby joining the team, was used at both the Civic Arena and the Consol Energy Center.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: The Penguins have two minor league affiliates assigned to their team. The Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins, their AHL affiliate, have played in Wilkes-Barre Township, Pennsylvania, since 1999. The Penguins also have a secondary affiliate in the ECHL, the Wheeling Nailers, which they have been associated with since the start of the 2000–01 season.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: "Note: GP = Games played, W = Wins, L = Losses, T = Ties, OTL = Overtime Losses, Pts = Points, GF = Goals for, GA = Goals against"


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: The Pittsburgh Penguins presently acknowledge an affiliation with a number of inductees to the Hockey Hall of Fame. Inductees affiliated with the Penguins include 14 former players and five builders of the sport. The four individuals recognized as builders by the Hockey Hall of Fame includes former head coaches, and general managers.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: In addition to builders and players, broadcasters and sports journalists have also been recognized by the Hockey Hall of Fame. In 2001, radio play-by-play broadcaster Mike Lange, was awarded the Foster Hewitt Memorial Award from the Hall of Fame. In 2009, Dave Molinari, a sports journalist for the "Pittsburgh Post-Gazette" was awarded the Elmer Ferguson Memorial Award from the Hall of Fame.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: These are the top-ten point-scorers in franchise history. Figures are updated after each completed NHL regular season.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: These are the top-ten goaltenders in franchise history by wins. Figures are updated after each completed NHL regular season.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: These are the top-ten playoff point-scorers in franchise playoff history. Figures are updated after each completed NHL season.


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: "Note: Pos = Position; GP = Games played; G = Goals; A = Assists; Pts = Points; P/G = Points per game


title: Pittsburgh Penguins

text: The Pittsburgh Penguins Foundation conducts numerous community activities to support both youth and families through hockey education and charity assistance.


title: Conquistador

text: Conquistadors (, ) or conquistadores (, ; meaning 'conquerors') were the explorer-soldiers of the Spanish and Portuguese Empires of the 15th and 16th centuries. During the Age of Discovery, conquistadors sailed beyond Europe to the Americas, Oceania, Africa, and Asia, colonizing and opening trade routes. They brought much of the Americas under the dominion of Spain and Portugal.


title: Conquistador

text: After arrival in the West Indies in 1492, the Spanish, usually led by hidalgos from the west and south of Spain, began building an American empire in the Caribbean using islands such as Hispaniola, Cuba, and Puerto Rico as bases. From 1519 to 1521, Hernán Cortés waged a campaign against the Aztec Empire, ruled by Moctezuma II. From the territories of the Aztec Empire, conquistadors expanded Spanish rule to northern Central America and parts of what is now the southern and western United States, and from Mexico sailing the Pacific Ocean to the Philippines. Other conquistadors took over the Inca Empire after crossing the Isthmus of Panama and sailing the Pacific to northern Peru. As Francisco Pizarro subdued the empire, in a manner similar to Cortés, other conquistadores used Peru as a base for conquering much of Ecuador and Chile. Central Colombia, home of the Muisca was conquered by licentiate Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada, and its northern regions were explored by Rodrigo de Bastidas, Alonso de Ojeda, Juan de la Cosa, Pedro de Heredia and others. For southwestern Colombia, Bolivia, and Argentina, conquistadors from Peru combined parties with other conquistadors arriving more directly from the Caribbean and Río de la Plata-Paraguay respectively. All these conquests founded the basis for modern Hispanic America and the Hispanophone.


title: Conquistador

text: Spanish conquistadors also made significant explorations into the Amazon Jungle, Patagonia, the interior of North America, and the discovery and exploration of the Pacific Ocean. Conquistadors founded numerous cities, some of them in locations with pre-existing settlements, Manila and Mexico City.


title: Conquistador

text: Conquistadors in the service of the Portuguese Crown led numerous conquests for the Portuguese Empire across South America and Africa, as well as commercial colonies in Asia, founding the origins of modern Portuguese-speaking world in the Americas, Africa, and Asia. Notable Portuguese conquistadors include Afonso de Albuquerque who led conquests across India, the Persian Gulf, the East Indies, and East Africa, and Filipe de Brito e Nicote who led conquests into Burma.


title: Conquistador

text: Portugal established a route to China in the early 16th century, sending ships via the southern coast of Africa and founding numerous coastal enclaves along the route. Following the discovery in 1492 by Spaniards of the New World with Italian explorer Christopher Columbus' first voyage there and the first circumnavigation of the world by Juan Sebastián Elcano in 1521, expeditions led by conquistadors in the 16th century established trading routes linking Europe with all these areas.


title: Conquistador

text: The Age of Exploration was hallmarked in 1519, shortly after Europe's discovery of the Americas, when Fernando Cortés begins his expedition on the Aztecan Empire. As the Spaniards, motivated by gold and fame, established relations and war with the Aztecs, the slow progression of conquest, erection of towns, and cultural dominance over the natives brought more Spanish troops and support to modern-day Mexico. As trading routes over the seas were established by the works of Columbus, Magellan, and Elcano, land support system was established as the trails of Cortés' conquest to the capital.


title: Conquistador

text: Human infections gained worldwide transmission vectors for the first time: from Africa and Eurasia to the Americas and "vice versa". The spread of old-world diseases, including smallpox, flu and typhus, led to the deaths of many indigenous inhabitants of the New World.


title: Conquistador

text: In the 16th century perhaps 240,000 Spaniards entered American ports. By the late 16th century gold and silver imports from America provided one-fifth of Spain's total budget.


title: Conquistador

text: Contrary to popular belief, the conquistadors were not trained warriors, but mostly artisans seeking an opportunity to advance their wealth and fame. A few also had crude firearms known as arquebus. Their units ("compañia") would often specialize in forms of combat that required long periods of training that were too costly for informal groups. Their armies were mostly composed of Spanish, as well as soldiers from other parts of Europe and Africa.


title: Conquistador

text: Native allied troops were largely infantry equipped with armament and armour that varied geographically. Some groups consisted of young men without military experience, Catholic clergy who helped with administrative duties, and soldiers with military training. These native forces often included African slaves and Native Americans, some of whom were also slaves. They were not only made to fight in the battlefield but also to serve as interpreters, informants, servants, teachers, physicians, and scribes. India Catalina and Malintzin were Native American women slaves who were forced to work for the Spaniards.


title: Conquistador

text: Castilian law prohibited foreigners and non-Catholics from settling in the New World. However, not all conquistadors were Castilian. Many foreigners Hispanicised their names and/or converted to Catholicism to serve the Castilian Crown. For example, Ioánnis Fokás (known as Juan de Fuca) was a Castilian of Greek origin who discovered the strait that bears his name between Vancouver Island and Washington state in 1592. German-born Nikolaus Federmann, Hispanicised as Nicolás de Federmán, was a "conquistador" in Venezuela and Colombia. The Venetian Sebastiano Caboto was Sebastián Caboto, Georg von Speyer Hispanicised as Jorge de la Espira, Eusebio Francesco Chini Hispanicised as Eusebio Kino, Wenceslaus Linck was Wenceslao Linck, Ferdinand Konščak, was Fernando Consag, Amerigo Vespucci was Américo Vespucio, and the Portuguese Aleixo Garcia was known as Alejo García in the Castilian army.


title: Conquistador

text: The origin of many people in mixed expeditions was not always distinguished. Various occupations, such as sailors, fishermen, soldiers and nobles employed different languages (even from unrelated language groups), so that crew and settlers of Iberian empires recorded as Galicians from Spain were actually using Portuguese, Basque, Catalan, Italian and Languedoc languages, which were wrongly identified.


title: Conquistador

text: Castilian law banned Spanish women from travelling to America unless they were married and accompanied by a husband. Women who travelled thus include María de Escobar, María Estrada, Marina Vélez de Ortega, Marina de la Caballería, Francisca de Valenzuela, Catalina de Salazar. Some conquistadors married Native American women or had illegitimate children.


title: Conquistador

text: European young men enlisted in the army because it was one way out of poverty. Catholic priests instructed the soldiers in mathematics, writing, theology, Latin, Greek, and history, and wrote letters and official documents for them. King's army officers taught military arts. An uneducated young recruit could become a military leader, elected by their fellow professional soldiers, perhaps based on merit. Others were born into hidalgo families, and as such they were members of the Spanish nobility with some studies but without economic resources. Even some rich nobility families' members became soldiers or missionaries, but mostly not the firstborn heirs.


title: Conquistador

text: The two most famous conquistadors were Hernán Cortés who conquered the Aztec Empire and Francisco Pizarro who led the conquest of the Inca Empire. They were second cousins born in Extremadura, where many of the Spanish conquerors were born.


title: Conquistador

text: Catholic religious orders that participated and supported the exploration, evangelizing and pacifying, were mostly Dominicans, Carmelites, Franciscans and Jesuits, for example Francis Xavier, Bartolomé de Las Casas, Eusebio Kino, Juan de Palafox y Mendoza or Gaspar da Cruz. In 1536, Dominican friar Bartolomé de las Casas went to Oaxaca to participate in a series of discussions and debates among the Bishops of the Dominican and Franciscan orders. The two orders had very different approaches to the conversion of the Indians. The Franciscans used a method of mass conversion, sometimes baptizing many thousands of Indians in a day. This method was championed by prominent Franciscans such as Toribio de Benavente.


title: Conquistador

text: The conquistadors took many different roles, including religious leader, harem keeper, King or Emperor, deserter and Native American warrior. "Caramuru" was a Portuguese settler in the Tupinambá Indians. Gonzalo Guerrero was a Maya war leader for Nachan can, Lord of Chactemal. Gerónimo de Aguilar, who had taken holy orders in his native Spain, was captured by Maya lords too, and later was a soldier with Hernán Cortés. Francisco Pizarro had children with more than 40 women. The chroniclers Pedro Cieza de León, Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo y Valdés, Diego Durán, Juan de Castellanos and friar Pedro Simón wrote about the Americas.


title: Conquistador

text: After Mexico fell, Hernán Cortés's enemies Bishop Fonseca, Diego Velázquez de Cuéllar, Diego Columbus and Francisco Garay were mentioned in Cortés' fourth letter to the King in which he describes himself as the victim of a conspiracy.


title: Conquistador

text: The division of the booty produced bloody conflicts, such as the one between Pizarro and De Almagro. After present-day Peruvian territories fell to Spain, Francisco Pizarro dispatched "El Adelantado", Diego de Almagro, before they became enemies to the Inca Empire's northern city of Quito to claim it. Their fellow conquistador Sebastián de Belalcázar, who had gone forth without Pizarro's approval, had already reached Quito. The arrival of Pedro de Alvarado from the lands known today as Mexico in search of Inca gold further complicated the situation for De Almagro and Belalcázar. De Alvarado left South America in exchange for monetary compensation from Pizarro. De Almagro was executed in 1538, by Hernando Pizarro's orders. In 1541 Lima, supporters of Diego Almagro II assassinated Francisco Pizarro. In 1546, De Belalcázar ordered the execution of Jorge Robledo, who governed a neighbouring province in yet another land-related vendetta. De Belalcázar was tried in absentia, convicted and condemned for killing Robledo and for other offenses pertaining to his involvement in the wars between armies of conquistadors. Pedro de Ursúa was killed by his subordinate Lope de Aguirre who crowned himself king while searching for "El Dorado". In 1544, Lope de Aguirre and Melchor Verdugo (a "converso" Jew) were at the side of Peru's first viceroy Blasco Núñez Vela, who had arrived from Spain with orders to implement the New Laws and suppress the encomiendas. Gonzalo Pizarro, another brother of Francisco Pizarro, rose in revolt, killed viceroy Blasco Núñez Vela and most of his Spanish army in the battle in 1546, and Gonzalo attempted to have himself crowned king.


title: Conquistador

text: The Emperor commissioned bishop Pedro de la Gasca to restore the peace, naming him president of the "Audiencia" and providing him with unlimited authority to punish and pardon the rebels. Gasca repealed the New Laws, the issue around which the rebellion had been organized. Gasca convinced Pedro de Valdivia, explorer of Chile, Alonso de Alvarado another searcher for "El Dorado", and others that if he were unsuccessful, a royal fleet of 40 ships and 15,000 men was preparing to sail from Seville in June.


title: Conquistador

text: Infante Dom Henry the Navigator of Portugal, son of King João I, became the main sponsor of exploration travels. In 1415, Portugal conquered Ceuta, its first overseas colony.


title: Conquistador

text: Throughout the 15th century, Portuguese explorers sailed the coast of Africa, establishing trading posts for tradable commodities such as firearms, spices, silver, gold, and slaves crossing Africa and India. In 1434 the first consignment of slaves was brought to Lisbon; slave trading was the most profitable branch of Portuguese commerce until the Indian subcontinent was reached. Due to the importation of the slaves as early as 1441, the kingdom of Portugal was able to establish a number of population of slaves throughout the Iberia due to its slave markets' dominance within Europe. Before the Age of Conquest began, the continental Europe already associated darker skin color with slave-class, attributing to the slaves of African origins. This sentiment traveled with the conquistadors when they began their explorations into the Americas. The predisposition inspired a lot of the entradas to seek slaves as part of the conquest.


title: Conquistador

text: After his father's death in 1479, Ferdinand II of Aragón married Isabella of Castile, unifying both kingdoms and creating the Kingdom of Spain. He later tried to incorporate the kingdom of Portugal by marriage. Notably, Isabella supported Columbus's first voyage that launched the conquistadors into action.


title: Conquistador

text: The Iberian Peninsula was largely divided before the hallmark of this marriage. Five independent kingdoms: Portugal in the West, Aragon and Navarre in the East, Castile in the large center, and Granada in the south, all had independent sovereignty and competing interests. The conflict between Christians and Muslims to control Iberia, which started with North Africa's Muslim invasion in 711, lasted from the years 718 to 1492. Christians, fighting for control, successfully pushed the Muslims back to Granada, which was the Muslim's last control of the Iberian Peninsula.


title: Conquistador

text: The marriage between Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabel of Castile resulted in joint rule by the spouses of the two kingdoms, honoured as the "Catholic Monarchs" by Pope Alexander VI. Together, the Crown Kings saw about the fall of Granada, victory over the Muslim minority, and expulsion or forcibly converted Jews and non-Christians to turn Iberia into a religious homogeneity.


title: Conquistador

text: The 1492 discovery of the New World by Spain rendered desirable a delimitation of the Spanish and Portuguese spheres of exploration. Thus dividing the world into two areas of exploration and colonization. This was settled by the Treaty of Tordesillas (7 June 1494) which modified the delimitation authorized by Pope Alexander VI in two bulls issued on 4 May 1493. The treaty gave to Portugal all lands which might be discovered east of a meridian drawn from the Arctic Pole to the Antarctic, at a distance of west of Cape Verde. Spain received the lands west of this line.


title: Conquistador

text: The known means of measuring longitude were so inexact that the line of demarcation could not in practice be determined, subjecting the treaty to diverse interpretations. Both the Portuguese claim to Brazil and the Spanish claim to the Moluccas depended on the treaty. It was particularly valuable to the Portuguese as a recognition of their new-found, particularly when, in 1497–1499, Vasco da Gama completed the voyage to India.


title: Conquistador

text: Later, when Spain established a route to the Indies from the west, Portugal arranged a second treaty, the Treaty of Zaragoza.


title: Conquistador

text: "Sevilla la Nueva", established in 1509, was the first Spanish settlement on the island of Jamaica, which the Spaniards called "Isla de Santiago". The capital was in an unhealthy location and consequently moved around 1534 to the place they called "Villa de Santiago de la Vega", later named Spanish Town, in present-day Saint Catherine Parish.


title: Conquistador

text: After first landing on "Guanahani" island in "The Bahamas", Columbus found the island which he called "Isla Juana", later named Cuba. In 1511, the first "Adelantado" of Cuba, Diego Velázquez de Cuéllar founded the island's first Spanish settlement at Baracoa; other towns soon followed, including Havana, which was founded in 1515.


title: Conquistador

text: After he pacified Hispaniola, where the native Indians had revolted against the administration of governor Nicolás de Ovando, Diego Velázquez de Cuéllar led the conquest of Cuba in 1511 under orders from Viceroy Diego Columbus and was appointed governor of the island. As governor he authorized expeditions to explore lands further west, including the 1517 Francisco Hernández de Córdoba expedition to Yucatán. Diego Velázquez, ordered expeditions, one led by his nephew, Juan de Grijalva, to Yucatán and the Hernán Cortés expedition of 1519. He initially backed Cortés's expedition to Mexico, but because of his personal enmity for Cortés later ordered Pánfilo de Narváez to arrest him. Grijalva was sent out with four ships and some 240 men.


title: Conquistador

text: Hernán Cortés, led an expedition (entrada) to Mexico, which included Pedro de Alvarado and Bernardino Vázquez de Tapia. The Spanish campaign against the Aztec Empire had its final victory on 13 August 1521, when a coalition army of Spanish forces and native Tlaxcalan warriors led by Cortés and Xicotencatl the Younger captured the emperor Cuauhtemoc and Tenochtitlan, the capital of the Aztec Empire. The fall of Tenochtitlan marks the beginning of Spanish rule in central Mexico, and they established their capital of Mexico City on the ruins of Tenochtitlan. The Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire was one of the most significant events in world history.


title: Conquistador

text: In 1516 Juan Díaz de Solís, discovered the estuary formed by the confluence of the Uruguay River and the Paraná River.


title: Conquistador

text: In 1517 Francisco Hernández de Córdoba sailed from Cuba in search of slaves along the coast of Yucatán. The expedition returned to Cuba to report on the discovery of this new land.


title: Conquistador

text: After receiving notice from Juan de Grijalva of gold in the area of what is now Tabasco, the governor of Cuba, Diego de Velasquez, sent a larger force than had previously sailed, and appointed Cortés as Captain-General of the Armada. Cortés then applied all of his funds, mortgaged his estates and borrowed from merchants and friends to outfit his ships. Velásquez may have contributed to the effort, but the government of Spain offered no financial support.


title: Conquistador

text: Pedro Arias Dávila, Governor of the Island La Española was descended from a converso's family. In 1519 Dávila founded Darién, then in 1524 he founded Panama City and moved his capital there laying the basis for the exploration of South America's west coast and the subsequent conquest of Peru. Dávila was a soldier in wars against Moors at Granada in Spain, and in North Africa, under Pedro Navarro intervening in the Conquest of Oran. At the age of nearly seventy years he was made commander in 1514 by Ferdinand of the largest Spanish expedition.


title: Conquistador

text: Dávila sent Gil González Dávila to explore northward, and Pedro de Alvarado to explore Guatemala. In 1524 he sent another expedition with Francisco Hernández de Córdoba, executed there in 1526 by Dávila, by then aged over 85. Dávila's daughters married Rodrigo de Contreras and conquistador of Florida and Mississippi, the Governor of Cuba Hernando de Soto.


title: Conquistador

text: Dávila made an agreement with Francisco Pizarro and Diego de Almagro, which brought about the discovery of Peru, but withdrew in 1526 for a small compensation, having lost confidence in the outcome. In 1526 Dávila was superseded as Governor of Panama by Pedro de los Ríos, but became governor in 1527 of León in Nicaragua.


title: Conquistador

text: An expedition commanded by Pizarro and his brothers explored south from what is today Panama, reaching Inca territory by 1526. After one more expedition in 1529, Pizarro received royal approval to conquer the region and be its viceroy. The approval read: "In July 1529 the queen of Spain signed a charter allowing Pizarro to conquer the Inca. Pizarro was named governor and captain of all conquests in New Castile." The Viceroyalty of Peru was established in 1542, encompassing all Spanish holdings in South America.


title: Conquistador

text: During early 1536, the Adelantado of Canary Islands, Pedro Fernández de Lugo, arrived to Santa Marta, a city founded in 1525 by Rodrigo de Bastidas in modern-day Colombia, as governor. After some expeditions to the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, Fernández de Lugo sent an expedition to the interior of the territory, initially looking for a land path to Peru following the Magdalena River. This expedition was commanded by Licentiate Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada, who ended up discovering and conquering the indigenous Muisca, and establishing the New Kingdom of Granada, which almost two centuries would be a viceroyalty. Jiménez de Quesada also founded the capital of Colombia, Santafé de Bogotá.


title: Conquistador

text: Juan Díaz de Solís arrived again to the renamed Río de la Plata, literally river of the silver, after the Incan conquest. He sought a way to transport the Potosi's silver to Europe. For a long time due to the Incan silver mines, Potosí was the most important site in Colonial Spanish America, located in the current department of Potosí in Bolivia and it was the location of the Spanish colonial mint. The first settlement in the way was the fort of Sancti Spiritu, established in 1527 next to the Paraná River. Buenos Aires was established in 1536, establishing the Governorate of the Río de la Plata.


title: Conquistador

text: Africans were also conquistadors in the early Conquest campaigns in the Caribbean and Mexico. In the 1500s there were enslaved black, free black, and free black sailors on Spanish ships crossing the Atlantic and developing new routes of conquest and trade in the Americas. After 1521, the wealth and credit generated by the acquisition of the Mexica Empire funded auxiliary forces of black conquistadors that could number as many as five hundred. Spaniards recognized the value of these fighters.


title: Conquistador

text: One of the black conquistadors who fought against the Aztecs and survived the destruction of their empire was Juan Garrido. Born in Africa, Garrido lived as a young slave in Portugal before being sold to a Spaniard and acquiring his freedom fighting in the conquests of Puerto Rico, Cuba, and other islands. He fought as a free servant or auxiliary, participating in Spanish expeditions to other parts of Mexico (including Baja California) in the 1520s and 1530s. Granted a house plot in Mexico City, he raised a family there, working at times as a guard and town crier. He claimed to have been the first person to plant wheat in Mexico.


title: Conquistador

text: Sebastian Toral was an African slave and one of the first black conquistadors in the New World. While a slave, he went with his Spanish owner on a campaign. He was able to earn his freedom during this service. He continued as a free conquistador with the Spaniards to fight the Maya in Yucatán in 1540. After the conquests he settled in the city of Mérida in the newly formed colony of Yucatán with his family. In 1574, the Spanish crown ordered that all slaves and free blacks in the colony had to pay a tribute to the crown. However, Toral wrote in protest of the tax based on his services during his conquests. The Spanish king responded that Toral need not pay the tax because of his service. Toral died a veteran of three transatlantic voyages and two Conquest expeditions, a man who had successfully petitioned the great Spanish King, walked the streets of Lisbon, Seville, and Mexico City, and helped found a capital city in the Americas.


title: Conquistador

text: Juan Valiente was born West Africa and purchased by Portuguese traders from African slavers. Around 1530 he was purchased by Alonso Valiente to be a slaved domestic servant in Puebla, Mexico. In 1533 Juan Valiente made a deal with his owner to allow him to be a conquistador for four years with the agreement that all earnings would come back to Alonso. He fought for many years in Chile and Peru. By 1540 he was a captain, horseman, and partner in Pedro de Valdivia's company in Chile. He was later awarded an estate in Santiago; a city he would help Valdivia found. Both Alonso and Valiente tried to contact the other to make an agreement about Valiente's manumission and send Alonso his awarded money. They were never able to reach each other and Valiente died in 1553 in the Battle of Tucapel.


title: Conquistador

text: Other black conquistadors include Pedro Fulupo, Juan Bardales, Antonio Pérez, and Juan Portugués. Pedro Fulupo was a black slave that fought in Costa Rica. Juan Bardales was an African slave that fought in Honduras and Panama. For his service he was granted manumission and a pension of 50 pesos. Antonio Pérez was from North Africa, and a free black. He joined the conquest in Venezuela and was made a captain. Juan Portugués fought in the conquests in Venezuela.