The NHL announced the Pittsburgh Penguins Quarter-Century team on Jan. 9, featuring several memorable names in franchise history.
Today, we want to examine Kris Letang’s tenure with the club and his credentials for being honored on the Penguins’ first team.
Letang came to the Penguins organization as a third-round pick (62nd overall) at the 2005 Draft, where they selected Sidney Crosby with the first overall pick.
Instead of jumping straight to the NHL, Letang opted to stay with Val-d’Or Foruers in the QMJHL. He was captain during his final season in 2006-07, scoring 52 points in 40 games. That year, he debuted with the Penguins, skating in seven games and scoring two goals.
By 2007-08, Letang had morphed into an NHL regular and has patrolled Pittsburgh’s blueline for the past 18 seasons, becoming only the third player in team history to surpass 1,000 games along with Crosby and Evgeni Malkin.
In year three, Letang scored ten goals for the first time. This was the first of ten seasons he’d reach double digits in goals, as he would become the franchise’s top-scoring defenseman with more than 170 goals.
At 20, Letang was a member of the Penguins, who lost in the 2008 Stanley Cup Final to the Detroit Red Wings. A year later, he would win the first of three championship rings when Pittsburgh defeated Detroit in Game 7.
During the 2010-11 season, when Letang was named to his first NHL All-Star Game, he scored a then-career-high 42 assists and 50 points while racking up 101 penalty minutes, the only time he’d reach triple digits in infractions.
Over the next four seasons, Letang scored more than ten goals on three occasions and compiled seasonal totals of 42, 38, 22, and 54.
However, the first time he would surpass 60 points came in 2015-16 when he lit the lamp for a career-high 16 goals and 51 assists for 67 points to finish the year second in team scoring behind Crosby.
In the spring, the Penguins advanced to the Stanley Cup Final, defeating the San Jose Sharks in six games. The following season, they repeated as championships with a six-game victory over the Nashville Predators.
Letang scored 15 points in 23 games during the 2016 playoff run but missed the entire 2017 postseason because of neck surgery. Fortunately, he skated in 41 regular season games to qualify to get his name on the Stanley Cup.
After two championship seasons, Letang went to three consecutive All-Star Games, scoring 40 goals and 151 points in 205 games. He tied his career high in goals (16) in 2018-19 and almost duplicated it the following year with 15.
At 34, he scored 68 points in 2021-22 thanks to ten goals and 58 assists, surpassing his previous career highs in both categories by seven assists and one point.
Including his totals thus far in 2024-25, Letang had 29 goals and 112 points in the past 193 games (as of Feb. 3), which ranks as the sixth-best total in the Penguins lineup.
As the highest-scoring defenseman in Pittsburgh history, Letang ranks first in so many categories, but here’s a breakdown of his totals among all players over the past 25 years:
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Games Played: 1,134 (3rd)
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Goals: 173 (5th)
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Assists: 589 (3rd)
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Points: 762 (3rd)
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Plus/Minus: Minus-87 (4th)
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Penalty Minutes: 779 (3rd)
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Power Play Goals: 55 (3rd)
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Power Play Points: 281 (3rd)
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Shorthanded Goals: 6 (7th)
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Shorthanded Points: 16 (3rd)
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Overtime Goals: 16 (3rd)
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Game-Winning Goals: 34 (3rd)
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Shots: 2,888 (3rd)
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Hits: 1,961 (2nd)
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Blocks: 1,711 (1st)
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Awards: Bill Masterton Memorial Trophy (2023)
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All-Star Games: 2011, 2012, 2016, 2018, 2019, 2020
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Honors: NHL All-Star Team (2nd) 2013, 2016
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Stanley Cup Wins: 2009, 2016, 2017
Letang has battled his fair share of injuries over his nearly two-decade career, including two strokes. He missed six weeks during the 2013-14 season and returned after only 11 days following his second one in 2022-23.
At the end of the season, Letang won the Bill Masterton Memorial Trophy, the only NHL hardware he’d won in his Hall of Fame-worthy career.
The now 37-year-old has three seasons left on his current deal, which runs until the end of the 2027-28 season. He’s on pace to surpass 1,200 games, 200 goals, 600 assists, and 800 points.
After 19 seasons together, Crosby, Malkin, and Letang are a part of North American sports history as the longest-tenured teammates of all time, an extraordinary achievement in their respective careers.
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