The Pittsburgh Penguins are set to welcome a new executive to the front office.Kyle Dubas was introduced as the team's president of hockey operations Thursday.Dubas' hiring comes nearly two months after the Penguins parted ways with Ron Hextall and Brian Burke, the former general manager and head of hockey operations, respectively, as Pittsburgh failed to reach the playoffs for the first time in 17 years."I heard a lot of people say they were skeptical of the team's ability to contend here, and the way I view it is that if people want to bet against Mike Sullivan, Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Kris Letang and others, they can go ahead and do so, but I'm going to bet on them and go with them here," Dubas said.The 37-year-old Dubas comes to Pittsburgh from Toronto, where he helped bring the Maple Leafs back to prominence before they were bounced from the playoffs in the second round. That led to Dubas not being retained as general manager, opening the door for him to come to Pittsburgh.During a news conference at PPG Paints Arena, Dubas explained the meetings that brought him to Pittsburgh, starting with a sit-down with the Penguins' ownership, Fenway Sports Group.Watch full video of the Kyle Dubas news conference below. "From my view, it was just a remarkable meeting in terms of hearing the way that they view a sports organization, the way that they want to build things out, the short-term competitiveness but the long-range capacity to build an organization that can sustain success," Dubas said. "Then it was, you know, having time with Sully and Sid."As he starts working toward the upcoming season, Dubas has plenty on his plate: The NHL draft on June 28; finding a general manager to replace the fired Ron Hextall; and making some decisions on the team's goaltending situation."I see this task ahead of us as a two-pronged effort," Dubas said. "In the short run, it's continuing to make decisions that are going to allow the team to be competitive while the core group of players that have led the team here to championships in the past continue to outperform at the levels that they have for as long as they can.""At the same time, the work will also begin at delivering a long-term hockey organization that can be the class of the NHL, and to reduce any gap in time that there otherwise would be from the end of those great players' careers to the next era of great hockey for the Pittsburgh Penguins."As the Maple Leafs' GM, Dubas led the team to a regular-season record of 221-109-42 with a .651 points percentage, ranking fifth in the league in wins and points percentage. Three of the five best regular seasons in Maple Leafs history by wins and points percentage came under his tenure.