Pittsburgh Penguins head coach Dan Bylsma decided to give his captain a break from the media on Monday.

“Every day doesn’t need to be Sidney Crosby day,” Bylsma replied when asked why Crosby, who many refer to as the face of the NHL, wasn’t on the roster of Penguins players made available to the media on the eve of Game 3.

NHL media relations pushed hard to encourage the Penguins to reconsider, but in the end they relented with a compromise that included Pittsburgh sending five players to the media area.

Sergei Gonchar, Matt Cooke, Chris Kunitz, Tyler Kennedy and Kris Letang faced reporters.

Bylsma defended his decision to give Crosby the day off by acknowledging the importance of other players experiencing the full responsibility of the Stanley Cup final.

“We made a choice to give other people a chance to be up here (on the media podium) and for you to talk to them and feel it’s important for it to be a team thing, not just Dan Bylsma and Sidney Crosby talking at the podium every day,” Bylsma said.

It should be noted that Evgeni Malkin refused to speak to the media following Game 2 and was also unavailable in Pittsburgh on Monday.

TSN.ca