STOCKHOLM -- Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and Kris Letang have experienced a lot together during their 20 seasons as teammates with the Pittsburgh Penguins and are excited to begin another adventure after arriving Tuesday for the 2025 NHL Global Series Sweden presented by Fastenal.
The Penguins (9-5-3) will face the Nashville Predators (5-9-4) at Avicii Arena on Friday (2 p.m. ET; FDSNSO, SN-PIT, NHLN, SN) and Sunday (9 a.m. ET; FDSNSO, SN-PIT, NHLN, SN), the first time in 17 years Crosby, Malkin and Letang will play here.
Crosby, Malkin, and Letang were also part of first NHL regular-season games played in Sweden when the Penguins opened 2008-09 by playing two games against the Ottawa Senators in the 2008 NHL Premiere. Although Crosby played in Stockholm as recently as the 2025 IIHF World Championship with Canada, he hasn't been back here with Malkin and Letang since those two games in 2008.
"It's fun," Crosby said after the Penguins practiced at Hovet Arena. "We probably thought we were going to do a ton of stuff like this when you start off the way we did with the Winter Classic and the outdoor games and coming over here. We probably thought, 'Well, this is going to be an every-other-year type of thing,' and it doesn't always work out that way."
These will be the 17th and 18th NHL regular-season games played in Stockholm, which is the most of any city outside North America. NHL regular-season games in Europe were a novelty in 2008, though.
Before the Anaheim Ducks and Los Angeles Kings opened the 2007-08 season with two games in London, the only NHL regular-season games played outside of North America were played in Japan in 1997, 1998 and 2000. There had been preseason games played previously in Sweden, but Crosby remembered the anticipation ahead of those first games in the country that counted in the standings.
"It was a fairly new concept and pretty cool to be a part of that," he said. "Similar to playing in the first Winter Classic (Jan. 1, 2008), doing something that really hadn't been done before. So, it was a great experience being over here for a week and I really enjoyed it."