MARC-ANDRE FLEURY | PHOTO COURTESY OF PITTSBURGH PENGUINS

It was a night of heartfelt emotion, and if you were reduced to tears at any point during the Marc-Andre Fleury sendoff this week at PPG Paints Arena, you no doubt had good reason.

You were also probably far from alone.

The problem with “Fleury Fest” and nights like it is they represent not just what the Penguins once were but also what they’ve become.

In you missed what had transpired leading up to Tuesday night — you’ve been busy, you’ve been focused on Pitt, Penn State, the Steelers or the World Series, or something with an element of mystery — Wild 5, Penguins 3 should have caught you up sufficiently.

The Pens took a two-goal lead and blew it.

The Pens gave up goals late in a period and early in a period.

The Pens gave up at least four goals for the ninth time in 11 games and failed to give up fewer than three for the 11th consecutive time to open the season.

And the Pens’ losing streak reached six in a row.

The star of the show and the guest of honor was Fleury, one of the most accomplished and most beloved players in franchise history, and the goaltender who backstopped the Pens to the 2008-09 Stanley Cup championship (the first of three in the Sidney Crosby Era) on the occasion of what was likely the final game in Pittsburgh of his career (which is winding down in Minnesota on the way to the Hockey Hall of Fame).

Remembering when, sadly, is what the Pens have been reduced to in what has quickly become a struggle even President of Hockey Operations and General Manager Kyle Dubas likely didn’t see coming.

In advance of the opener on Oct. 9, Dubas tried to warn everyone that this season needed to be perceived differently, with adjusted expectations and aspirations, when he announced the Penguins “don’t come in with any preconceived notions anymore that we’re going to walk in and be a favorite or we’re gonna walk in and strike fear into anybody.”

“It’s going to be very difficult,” Dubas emphasized.

Almost on cue, the Pens lost to the Rangers, 6-0, for openers.

Since then it’s mostly been an avalanche of odd-man rushes against, of blown leads, of giving up goals in rapid-fire succession and in bunches.

Bad hockey.

Remarkably, the power play was a respectable 11th in the NHL through 11 games with a 22.6% success rate.

That unit was vilified a season ago (as if the power play was somehow a separate entity rather than a product of the players who comprise it) as the main reason, perhaps as the sole reason the Penguins failed to make the playoffs for a second consecutive season.

In the early going this time around, however, the power play was actually holding up its end.

And yet through 11 games, the Pens were last in the Metropolitan Division, last in the Eastern Conference and second-to-last in the NHL’s overall standings with seven points at 3-7-1.

Through their first 11 games, the Pens won twice in regulation.

And their average of 4.23 goals against per game was the worst in the NHL.

On the way to the brink of rock bottom, the Penguins at least got to celebrate Crosby’s 1,600th career point (on Oct. 16) and Evgeni Malkin’s 500th career goal (the same night, which ended with an overtime win over Buffalo) and Fleury.

The good news — perhaps the only good news — is more such opportunities to reminisce about the good old days loomed in advance of game No. 12 against Anaheim.

Kris Letang stood two games away of 1,100 in his career.

Crosby was two even-strength goals behind Luc Robitaille for the 13th-most such scores all-time (418), one game-winning goal shy of a six-way tie for 16th all-time in that department (93), and three assists from matching Joe Sakic for 13th in NHL history (1,016).

Another positive to the Pens’ awful start is there’s almost nowhere to go but up.

In the meantime, the in-game entertainment department would do well to keep those tribute videos coming.

Mike Prisuta is the sports anchor/reporter for Randy Baumann and the DVE Morning Show. He’s also the host of the Steelers Radio Network Pregame Show and the color analyst for Robert Morris University men’s hockey broadcasts.