PITTSBURGH — Mike Knuble teed up a puck on a wooden platform a few inches above Heinz Field's green grass Tuesday and lofted a perfectly placed wrist shot between the uprights.
Call it the first goal by an NHL player on the Pittsburgh Steelers' home turf. Or was it the first field goal?
On a postcard-perfect, 85-degree midsummer day — 47 degrees above the average high temperature for Jan. 1 in Pittsburgh — the NHL previewed its Winter Classic, which will pit the Penguins against Knuble's Washington Capitals in what might be the sport's best rivalry.
Somehow, everything seemed to fit Tuesday in one of the NFL's best-known stadiums, with the hockey rink perfectly placed for spectators between Heinz's 20-yard lines. Center ice will be at the 50. There was no such comfortable fit when the Winter Classic rink was wedged into baseball's Fenway Park and Wrigley Field the last two seasons.
"We're going to have an unbelievable chance to make great memories in a special event like this," Penguins star Sidney Crosby said. "It seems like this is a great setup. I don't know what the baseball stadiums were like, but this one seems like a pretty normal fit."
Even the matchup seems perfectly suited to the one-game-can-mean-everything environment so prevalent in football. While Capitals vs. Penguins on New Year's Day will be only one of 82 regular-season games for both teams, it will mean more than that.
For the Capitals' Alexander Ovechkin, who might be the NHL's most skilled offensive talent but doesn't yet have a Stanley Cup title, it's a chance to upstage his biggest rival on Crosby's home ice. For Crosby, it's an opportunity to be the biggest star in not one but two Winter Classics; he won the first in Buffalo in 2008 with a shootout goal.
"It's obviously a big rivalry," Penguins forward Max Talbot said. "I remember this past season when I was hurt and watching a game against Washington (the Capitals' 5-4 overtime win on Feb. 7) and it was probably the most intense regular-season game I've seen."
The rivalry already is so good — the teams' seven-game Eastern Conference playoff series two seasons ago was one of the NHL's most compelling in years — Crosby doesn't believe it will intensify by moving outdoors.
"I don't think you can imagine it being more intense than it already is," Crosby said. "It's there."
The Winter Classic will add one element to the rivalry, and it might be snow. As many as 12½ inches have fallen on Pittsburgh on a single day during the first week of January, and the mean temperature is in the high 20s. While some Januarys are milder than others, some are downright miserable.
"Maybe the first half it will be sunny, and the second half a storm will be coming in," Knuble said. "That will make it fun for everybody. A little bit of chaos is pretty fun."
