During a bitter playoff series last season with rival Pittsburgh, Braden Holtby showed an incredible amount of class when he gave his stick away to a Penguins fan battling cancer.
“It’s what we play the game for is to create positive influences on people,” Holtby said that day. “The Penguins are doing a great thing having him as their guest and luckily we got to share a little part of that and hopefully make his day a little better.”
On Tuesday, Holtby was back in Pittsburgh to practice with Team Canada ahead of his country’s final World Cup of Hockey exhibition game against Russia. This time he had kind words to say about the Pittsburgh organization and it’s definitely a thing you’re not going to enjoy reading.
[adinserter name=”nation-ad”]Holtby on Pittsburgh: "It’s probably the benchmark for the league in terms of what they’ve done here. Guys are pretty lucky that play here."
— Pittsburgh Penguins (@penguins) September 13, 2016
Penguins fans really enjoyed the quote.
@penguins he lowkey wants to be a penguin
— Brandon J Miller (@BrandonJMiller7) September 13, 2016
@penguins He's probably wishing his sweater had a penguin on it.
— Talha Javaid (@NHLJavaid65) September 13, 2016
@penguins holtby to Pittsburgh confirmed
— Alex Shahan (@AlexPensPitt) September 13, 2016
@penguins @tyler_connors13 he knows
— Alex (@akkie58) September 13, 2016
Just for the record, Holtby is ours until 2020 – just in case anybody gets any crazy ideas.
Related: Here’s a photo of Alex Ovechkin and Evgeny Kuznetsov playing poker with Evgeni Malkin at his home in Pittsburgh.
