When the puck drops tonight at PPG Paints Arena between Pittsburgh's beloved hockey franchise, off to an inspired start amid a wave of injury and illness, and the two-time defending champion Lightning, there'll be empty seats all over the place. Entire empty rows, even.
And it won't mean a damned thing.
It won't mean any more than the Penguins' 14-year, 633-game sellout streak having ended a week ago with a crowd of 16,450, or that the crowd for the next home game was 15,397.
It won't mean any more than the Steelers, who've sold every single ticket since 1972, averaging 7,789 no-shows through their first four games this season at Heinz Field, including a jarring 10,325 empty yellow seats for a loss to the Bengals a month ago.