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Gretzky rocketed to 164 points as a 20-year-old and then to an unprecedented 212 points, including a record 92 goals, the following year. Gretzky would average more than two points per game in 10 seasons, including a record 2.77 in 1983--84. From Crosby's perspective a 150-point season now represents "a stretch." Linemate Mark Recchi, who broke into the NHL in 1988--89 and ranked 28th alltime in points, suggests that--given that the game is coached to the nth degree and there are superior (and better-protected) goaltenders, generally stouter team defense and fewer awful teams--an average of two points per game would be the postmodern parallel to some of Gretzky's stratospheric seasons. "For a guy to get to 160, he'd have to be on a damn good team," Recchi said. "He'd have to be surrounded with three good lines so teams couldn't focus on him. We're not far from that here."

Pittsburgh indeed has added the flashy rookie Evgeni Malkin (44 points in 39 games) and 18-year-old Jordan Staal, the precocious No. 2 pick last June. Still Crosby is the fulcrum: The Penguins are winless in the 31 career matches in which he has failed to produce a point. After a losing streak of five games last month, in which Crosby had only one goal and three assists, coach Michel Therrien moved Malkin from second-line center to Crosby's flank. The unilingual 20-year-old Russian and the Canadian teen don't share a language. But they seem to engage in virtual conversations on the ice that no one else can comprehend, Crosby slipping into spots he might not otherwise go because Malkin will be able to make sense of the kaleidoscope of possibility.

Malkin's a terrific sidekick, but of course by Gretzky's second NHL season the Oilers had Jari Kurri, Mark Messier, Glenn Anderson and Paul Coffey.

"When Gretz had five points, he had his leg over the boards trying to get a sixth--just an insatiable desire to score," says Oilers coach Craig MacTavish, Gretzky's teammate in Edmonton between 1985 and '88 and, briefly, in St. Louis in 1996. "You certainly see the passion Crosby has, the emotion he shows when he scores. It looks like Crosby has that similar [hunger], along with a helluva lot of skill.... Everybody says they know where they were when they heard [President] Kennedy was shot. Now [in hockey] we all remember where we were when Pittsburgh won the [2005 draft] lottery."

Crosby demurs. He is an alternate captain, not chief of state. He has accepted his role as a touchstone of hockey with a certain grace, a little too courtly at times for his years but never presumptuous. When the Red Wings were soliciting testimonials to celebrate the Jan. 2 retirement of Steve Yzerman's jersey--and the Penguins were close to blowing the deadline-- Pittsburgh vice president of communications Tom McMillan asked Crosby before a practice in Atlanta if he could come up with an idea that McMillan could craft into something to send to Detroit in Crosby's name. When Crosby came off the ice, drenched in sweat, he immediately summoned McMillan and began dictating two neatly crafted sentences about Yzerman, which clearly he had been thinking about during the drills. "I could have written it for him," McMillan says, "only not as well."

Crosby's willingness to do the right thing off the ice may ultimately link him to Gretzky more than points scored. "I don't put pressure on myself to be Wayne Gretzky," Crosby says. "And I don't put pressure on myself to even try to get close to his numbers. Sometimes you hear a stat, and it's like, 'Wow, I'm in the same ballpark.' Outside of that, I've pretty much come to the realization his numbers can't be touched."

What Crosby is pursuing, unrelentingly, are the outer limits of his own ability. In his second season he came back a stride faster and noticeably stronger. His confidence swelled. His petulance shriveled. "Last year he whined a lot [about calls], and a lot of guys in the league hated him for it," one prominent Eastern Conference defenseman says. "This year he's toned it down." Crosby thinks the incremental improvement is principally a result of familiarity with the NHL. "If you're playing [against Devils center] John Madden, and you're shut down for two periods, you have to realize you still might be playing well," he says. "Last year I'd have a couple of good games and run into New Jersey, and I'm like, 'What's going on with me?' Maybe now I have a little more patience."

He takes no shifts off, sometimes no days off. On a scheduled off day in October, Crosby, feeling displeased with his shot, had an equipment manager cover the lower part of the net with a sheet of plywood and worked on corralling rebounds and lifting pucks. He took perhaps 500 shots. Mostly, he took responsibility. "Best player in the game," Penguins assistant coach Andr� Savard says, "and the hardest working."

"I like that he isn't piling up points on the power play," Toronto scout Craig Button says of Crosby, who also led the NHL in even-strength points with 39. "[Also] he puts up numbers in division games"--Crosby was averaging 2.12 points per game against Atlantic Division teams this season--"which tells you he's a big-game guy."

If hockey's cognoscenti genuflect to Crosby, he goes on bended knee himself at times, scoring one from the marriage-proposal position last week at Tampa. This was only his second-most spectacular goal against the Lightning in three days. Earlier, in Pittsburgh, he had scored while prone, the only time he can be accused of lying down on the job.