The Pittsburgh Penguins have named Scotty Bowman, Ron Francis, Eddie Johnston and Kevin Stevens to the Penguins Hall of Fame ‘Class of 2025’, it was announced today by President of Hockey Operations and General Manager Kyle Dubas.
The Class of 2025 will be honored with an on-ice ceremony prior to the home game on Saturday, October 25 versus the Columbus Blue Jackets. Special programming with the Class of 2025 will be announced in the coming weeks.
Tickets to attend the Hall of Fame game on October 25 can be found here.
Bowman, 92, spent three seasons with the Penguins during what was considered the most dominant three-year span in franchise history (1990-93). Bowman began as Director of Player Personnel in 1990-91, before spending the next two seasons behind the bench, helping Pittsburgh go Stanley Cup Champion-Stanley Cup Champion-Presidents’ Trophy Winner in his three years with the team.
While still on the management side between the summer of 1990 and the ’91 trade deadline, Bowman helped bring in the likes of Ron Francis, Ulf Samuelsson, Joe Mullen, Larry Murphy, Bryan Trottier and Scott Young. As a head coach in 1992-93, he helped the club establish franchise records for wins (56), points (119) and goals for (367), and also established a 17-game regular-season win streak that’s still an NHL record.
Acquired in “The Trade” from the Hartford Whalers in 1991 that transformed the Penguins into Stanley Cup contenders, Francis skated in 533 games with Pittsburgh tallying 164 goals, 449 assists and 613 points and added 32 goals, 68 assists and 100 points in 97 playoff games. The two-time Stanley Cup Champion with Pittsburgh (1991, ’92) hit the 100-point plateau twice and 90-point mark four times in the black and gold, with his point total ranking third among Penguins behind only Jaromir Jagr and Mario Lemieux during his tenure with the team.
Francis, 62, won the Selke Trophy as the League’s top defensive forward while leading the NHL in assists (92) in 1995-96 and his 449 assists during his Pittsburgh career were tops among Penguins players and third among all NHL players during that time. During his eight-season career with the Penguins, Francis, who captained the Penguins in 1994-95 and ’97-98, ranked fourth among all NHL players in playoff points and assists. Twenty years post-retirement, the two-time Penguins Team MVP still sits fifth in NHL history with 1,798 points and second with 1,249 assists.
Johnston, 89, has spent nearly 50 years with the Penguins in various capacities, but enjoyed two memorable stints with the Penguins – first between 1980-88, when his tenure as the team’s general manager laid the groundwork for eventual back-to-back titles in 1991 and ’92; and later as head coach from 1993-97. As general manager, Johnston was responsible for selecting Mario Lemieux with the first overall pick in the 1984 NHL Draft and trading for superstars Paul Coffey and Kevin Stevens.
The third-winningest head coach (232 wins) and second-longest tenured (516 games) head coach in club history, Johnston enjoyed great regular-season success from 1993-97. During that span, the Penguins ranked second in the NHL with 153 wins, third in points, first in goals for and first in power-play percentage. Johnston coached the 1995-96 team which is the second-highest goal-scoring team in Penguins history. Overall, the team made the playoffs in five of Johnston’s six full seasons. He and Dan Bylsma remain the only Penguins coaches to win multiple division titles.
Stevens, 60, played for the Penguins from 1987-95 and returned for the final two years of his career from 2000-02. The two-time Stanley Cup Champion with the Penguins in 1991 and ’92 recorded 260 goals, 295 assists and 555 points in 522 regular-season games in the black and gold, and added 46 goals, 60 assists and 106 points in 103 playoff games. His goal, assist and point totals in the regular season and playoffs are all the most in franchise history among left wingers.
During his first tenure with the Penguins, the U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame member hit the 40-goal mark in four-consecutive seasons between 1990-94, including two 50-goal seasons in 1991-92 and ’92-93. The three-time NHL All Star with Pittsburgh tallied a career-high 123 points in ’91-92, which ranked second in the NHL behind only teammate Mario Lemieux and still stands as the second-highest single-season point total by a left wing in NHL history. Stevens holds NHL single-season playoff records by a left wing in goals (17) and points (33), both recorded in ’91, while his 17 goals are a Penguins record for a single playoff year.
Bowman, Francis, Johnston and Stevens are the first four of the 10 individuals announced as part of a three-year plan to relaunch the team’s Hall of Fame. The remaining six – Tom Barrasso, Jaromir Jagr, Chris Kunitz, Larry Murphy, Jim Rutherford and Ray Shero (posthumously) will be inducted over the next two years. The Class of 2025, along with all the other members that have been grandfathered in, will be featured in a physical Hall of Fame space on the FedEx main concourse level at PPG Paints Arena.
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