Penguins to open regular season with 4-game homestand

The Pittsburgh Penguins will open 2019-20 with a relatively soft early schedule filled with plenty of home games, but over the course of the next six-plus months, they’ll be tested by plenty of back-to-backs.

The Penguins open with a four-game homestand, starting with the Oct. 3 opener against Buffalo and followed by meetings with Columbus, Winnipeg and Anaheim. Six of their first eight games will be played at home.

All told, they’ll play 17 sets of games on back-to-back days, including 15 with travel. That’s more than the 11 sets they played last season but less than the league-leading 19 they had two seasons ago.

The Penguins will have a nine-day break around the All-Star Game in late January.

They’ll visit Philadelphia on Jan. 21 and not play again until they host the Flyers on Jan. 31. The All-Star Game is Jan. 26 in St. Louis.

Should the Penguins find themselves in a late-season playoff push, their last four games are against opponents that did not qualify for the postseason last year: Philadelphia, New Jersey, the Rangers and Ottawa.

Other notable games include:

• The Philadelphia Flyers will make their first visit to PPG Paints Arena early for an Oct. 29 date. The Washington Capitals don’t visit until March 7 and 22.

• Marc-Andre Fleury and the Vegas Golden Knights come to town Oct. 19. Olli Maatta will play his first game at the arena as a visitor when the Chicago Blackhawks visit Nov. 9.

• The Stanley Cup champion St. Louis Blues pay their lone visit Dec. 4.

• The Penguins and Nashville will play a home-and-home set right after Christmas on Dec. 27-28.

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Correction: Due to a technical glitch, a previous version of the graphic above showed the Penguins’ 2018-19 schedule. The graphic has been updated to reflect the 2019-20 schedule.