The Stanley Cup Finals begin Saturday night.

The anticipation is more like the World Series, actually — the World Series before the advent interleague play, that is.

The Penguins and Red Wings did not meet in the regular season. Neither team really knows the other, though both like to play the game the same way.

Possess the puck. Back-check. Force mistakes and capitalize.

This matchup is fascinating.

• Youth vs. experience. The Wings' average age is five years older than that of the Penguins.

• Chris Osgood vs. Marc-Andre Fleury. The two hottest goaltenders in the playoffs have radically different stories. Detroit's Osgood is 35, has been around the Stanley Cup playoff block a few times and is on his second tour of duty in the Motor City.

Fleury is 23 and had never won a Cup playoff series before this year.

• Hot vs. Hot. Pittsburgh is 12-2 in the playoffs, scoring 51 goals and allowing 26. Detroit is 12-4, scoring 55 goals and allowing 31.

While the Red Wings' journey to this point isn't all that surprising, the Penguins' certainly is.

In truth, they probably arrived here two or three years ahead of schedule.

Their captain, Sidney Crosby, is only 20 years old. It took even Mario Lemieux a few years in the NHLbefore the Penguins got to the playoffs.

The core of this team — Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Fleury, Jordan Staal — is still young.

The Penguins' success all comes back to the coach. In retrospect, the last great move made by longtime general manager Craig Patrick before his dismissal was the promotion of Michel Therrien from Wilkes-Barre/Scranton to the big club.

Therrien helped raise a lot of the current Penguins in terms of their hockey growth. At the time of his promotion two years ago, the Baby Penguins were 21-1-2 and riding an AHL-record 15-game winning streak.

Therrien immediately began ruling with an iron fist, publicly ridiculing the big club's lackluster defensive play and repeatedly calling out individual players for point-blank criticism.

When Ray Shero replaced Patrick as GM, the Therrien watch began.

The team was badly outclassed by Ottawa in the playoffs last year, then got off to a slow start this year. Therrien's job was dangling by a thread.

But it never snapped.

Mark Recchi and Gary Roberts were retained to give the Pens a veteran presence. The former was released for lack of production, the latter was hurt all year.

Crosby and Fleury went down with injuries for long stretches. Malkin and Ty Conklin bloomed in their absence and the team bought into Therrien's defense-first philosophy.

Now the Penguins are playing for the Stanley Cup. Tough personnel decisions loom, such as whether to keep Marian Hossa or Ryan Malone, how to keep free-agent defenseman Brooks Orpik from walking, etc.

But that stuff is for later.

Enjoy the moment — and thank the coach.

John Enrietto is sports editor of the Butler Eagle.