At 9:38 p.m. Tuesday, the final horn sounded.
Within a second of that, the scoreboard over the PPG Paints Arena ice, the one capped by Penguins 5, Maple Leafs 2, showed the Metro Division standings with the victors officially perched at the top upon overtaking the Capitals.
Within a couple seconds of that, the home bench emptied to tap the mask of Tristan Jarry while the visitors slinked away.
And within, oh, a few minutes of all of the above, both teams packed bags, pushed equipment boxes and embarked on a path that'll see them meet again in less than 48 hours in Toronto.
That, as they say, is hockey.
But that's also why, it says right here, all that we're witnessing in this most wonderful of winters in our little corner of the NHL world just might not be getting appropriately appreciated. Not on the outside, and not even on the inside.
Mostly because there just isn't time.
"I think the most important thing for us is to just keep going," Sidney Crosby told me when I'd broached this afterward. And even as he answered, he multitasked by offering a friendly nod to a departing acquaintance in the distance. "It's gotten us results. We believe in the way we play, so ..."
He looked up and smiled.
"Sitting back and admiring it, I don't think that's gonna do us any good at any point."
Watch the whole exchange to see what I mean:
Looks like he's got somewhere to be, right?
Well, he does. They all do.
And yet, fleeting as all this can feel for them, futile as it'll be if they somehow fall to this same sickly opponent Thursday night, that won't stop me from pressing pause for more of a macro view. With no need at any stage to light the applause lamp:
• First place.
Yep. With proof:
I know it's never meant much to this franchise -- their only division title that led to a Stanley Cup championship was the very first, in 1991 -- but it's still a significant achievement independent of all the injuries and illnesses, if only for the division being by far the NHL's most competitive.
• No, really, first freaking place.
In the first week of December, the Penguins, as well as they'd performed to that point, trailed the Capitals by 13 points. And all they've done since then is perform that much better at 23-6-2. Not exactly backing into position.
• All the injuries and illnesses.
Tuesday morning, Mike Sullivan made known that Zach Aston-Reese will be out 'week-to-week' with a lower-body injury. By nightfall, an ailing Evgeni Malkin failed to make it through warmups and was scratched. So, on the day the Penguins got back Dominik Kahun, they still wound up a minus-1.
Some might tire of hearing/reading incessantly all the man-games lost, but it's as applicable today as it's been all along: 247!
And even though Crosby's return has reestablished the team's equilibrium, we're still talking about missing a quarter of the roster for this game. And a meaningful quarter at that in Malkin, Jake Guentzel, Brian Dumoulin, John Marino and Nick Bjugstad.
This can't be stated often or forcefully enough. None of it. It's still happening.
• It's verifiably real.
There's no greater validator of wins/losses in sports than the accompanying accumulation of goals, points, runs, etc. Smokes out the phonies like no other statistic, advanced or otherwise.
Well, the Penguins' plus-42 goal differential ranks third-best in the league, behind only the Lightning's plus-56 and the Bruins' plus-53. Both of those teams, the unquestioned best anywhere at the moment, have benefited from two additional games toward their respective figures.
But if it's advanced statistics anyone seeks, those are there, too. My two favorites are both related to high-danger scoring chances: The Penguins convert 21.83 percent of their own, fifth-best in the NHL, which is why opponents often refer to them as opportunistic. And defensively, they've conceded 59 high-danger chances all season, third-fewest in the league. Boiled down, they're every bit as efficient in the other team's box as within their own.
• They take care of business.
Getting even more basic, nothing fosters stability like ... you know, doing what you should. A good team, for instance, should take care of home ice, and the record here is now 22-5-4, best in the NHL. A good team should emerge sound early in games, and the Penguins have allowed only 41 first-period goals in 59 games. A good team should hold its leads, and they're 17-1-2 when leading after the first, 22-2-1 when leading after the second.
But ask any hockey coach from Montreal to the Montour JV, and they'll cite first and foremost that a good team should shine on special teams.
So ...
That's three power-play goals, all not coincidentally crafted by Crosby, and that's 13 power-play goals in the past 13 games, all not coincidentally since Crosby came back.
Same goes for the PK, 4 for 4 against Toronto's No. 4-ranked power play, including an uplifting five-on-three kill, but also on a broader 26-for-29 roll.
The Penguins' power play is No. 9 after an awful start to the season, and the PK is now No. 7.
Only other teams to have both in the league's top 10: Uh-huh, Lightning and Bruins.
• Goaltending galore.
My goodness. Not sure what to say to this one anymore. Between Jarry and Matt Murray, we're watching alternating excellence, and we're doing so with the comfort of knowing both are constantly fresh and, with playoffs but a few weeks away, richly motivated for more.
As are they all, apparently.
I asked Jack Johnson, maybe the happiest human in this small circle, if he's allowed himself to enjoy any of what's happened.
"No, no, no," was the no-hesitation reply. "I mean, this is the NHL. There's just no time for that. We're just playing. That's it. Look at us. We're going up to Toronto after this and playing them again, and they'll be better than they were here. There's no time to take a breath, much less step back and think about what we've done."
Nothing at all?
Not even just shrugging off Malkin's illness?
"Heck, most of us didn't even know. And no one said anything to us before the game, either. The coaches walked in here and erased a couple of the lines on our board, put new lines up, and that was that. Not a word."
So, whatever, huh?
"Nothing changes. We just play the way we play. It's not like we haven't been doing that all along."
• Want to know who does take time to appreciate what the Penguins are doing these days?
The other team. All the time.
I went down the hall to ask Sheldon Keefe, the Maple Leafs' coach, what he thought about his opponent on this night, and I never had to do that since he brought them up unsolicited as a cynical comparison point for his own team: "They're just competing a higher level than we are. ... You see the difference between, you know, a team's that good some days and not-so-good others, and a team that's good all the time no matter who's in the lineup. You see the difference between them and us. They just work. And when you do that, the skilled players, they have the puck a lot more, and good things happen."
Ow. Just ow.
• And then this from Frederik Andersen, the Maple Leafs' goaltender: "Today was a good lesson in seeing the franchise that's built championship teams and they haven't really missed a step. Every time they've had a guy hurt, they've had another guy coming in and playing their bag off with their effort and their detail. Hopefully we can learn from it. But we better do it quick."
***premium***
Anthony Angello and Sam Lafferty celebrate the former's first NHL goal. - GETTY• Three things mattered most to the Penguins coming into this winter, as I'd been writing through 2019:
1. Malkin rebounding
2. Defensive excellence
3. Youth contributions
So far, obviously, the first two have been colossal check marks. The third ... let's just say this was a welcome sight, being that Anthony Angello's NHL icebreaker originated with a heads-up flick from Sam Lafferty:
• It's OK to not appreciate Johnson, but it's not at all justifiable to not acknowledge that there's a reason Sullivan and Jacques Martin trust Johnson -- and only Johnson -- to be the lone D-man when short two men. He was that again in the Maple Leafs' failed five-on-three in the second period, and he was excellent.
I asked if he enjoyed the role.
"Enjoy killing a five-on-three? I don't think anyone enjoys that," came the response that question deserved. "You're just getting into shooting lanes for blocks. I'm glad when we do it well, but I don’t think anyone likes it."
By the way, anyone who doesn't think killing off five-on-threes is that significant has already forgotten too much about the 2016 and 2017 playoffs.
• The paying customers at PPG Paints Arena take a lot of heat for being too docile, and that's not without merit. But one Pittsburgh tradition that's carried from the Civic Arena to this place is one I love, and that's the energy and support shown when the home team's down two men. By the time Teddy Blueger pounced for the fifth goal, just after that kill, the roof was ready to blow. It was beautiful.
• Honestly wouldn't surprise me if Sullivan stayed with Jarry for the rematch Thursday. Same opponent, plus confidence, plus ... man, he's just been phenomenal. No reflection on Murray, either.
• Back to the Leafs: They haven't won a thing since 1967. They haven't even reached the Stanley Cup Final since that same year, the last year, by the way, in which the NHL was a six-team intramural outfit. As such, they've been one of the worst franchises in professional sports in the past half-century.
This group's not going anywhere, either. Not now and not anytime soon. They'll win their occasional game, score their occasional flurry of highlight goals, film their occasional cross-Canada TV commercials and get hailed as the next coming of ... I don't know, Mats Sundin? But they won't go anywhere with half their payroll tied up in this particular core of Auston Matthews, John Tavares and Mitch Marner. Just won't.
Know why?
Because in Toronto, they'll always inflate the talent they have and think they're ready to contend before they are. Happened with these kids getting anointed the same way Nikolai Antropov once was and countless others. And the steady hand that's been needed all along will always get engulfed by the fan/media hysteria up there and push too soon.
• Thing is, they'll make the playoffs. The NHL's weird format will allow the third-place team in the Atlantic Division, no matter how bad, to make it, possibly with fewer points than either wild-card qualifier.
Once and for all, switch to two clean conference standings. Top eight make it. Everyone else out. It'd make it easier for newcomers to the sport to follow, as well.
• Great tale shared with me by a subscriber outside the arena well after the game: A Toronto fan who'd been seated two rows in front of her left his seat after the Penguins made it 5-0. Didn't come back for 20 minutes. But when he did, he'd draped a big black hoodie over his Maple Leafs sweater.
Not even sure if hysteria's a strong enough descriptive.
• They get to do it again Thursday. Dave Molinari will make that trip, covering the game a couple blocks away from where he's honored in the Hall of Fame.
PHOTO GALLERY
Penguins vs. Maple Leafs, Feb. 18, 2020, PPG Paints Arena. - GETTY