Had this game turned out differently, perhaps the talk when it was over would have centered on the goal Jeff Carter scored with 86 seconds left in the opening period.
Or perhaps the focus would have settled on the one Brian Boyle got a minute later to give the Penguins a 3-2 lead at the first intermission.
As it was, however, Boyle's sharp-angle shot from along the goal line to the right of the net was the last puck they got past Capitals goalie Ilya Samsonov, whose teammates scored the next four in what became a 6-3 Washington victory at PPG Paints Arena Saturday.
The loss was the Penguins' fourth in a row, all in regulation, and put them in legitimate peril of being overtaken by the fourth-place Capitals in the Metropolitan Division during the final three weeks of the regular season.
Understandably, then, the goals by Carter and Boyle -- as well as the generally strong showing by the Penguins' third and fourth lines -- were reduced to footnotes after a particularly disheartening defeat for a team that's in a 2-6-1 free fall.
That doesn't mean, however, that any of it went unnoticed.
"Brian Boyle scores a goal," Mike Sullivan said. "Jeff Carter scores a goal. They helped us, offensively, for sure."
With Sidney Crosby and Jason Zucker rejoining the lineup, Sullivan was able to construct third and fourth lines that appeared to be reasonably close to what he's likely to deploy during the playoffs.
Oh, there's no question Sullivan will clear a spot for Brock McGinn when he's deemed healthy enough to play, but the combinations he used against the Capitals -- Carter between Evan Rodrigues and Kasperi Kapanen and Boyle and Danton Heinen flanking Teddy Blueger -- filled their roles effectively, a charge that wouldn't stick against some of their teammates.
"The fact that they scored tonight gives us a chance to win the hockey game," Sullivan said. "I think that speaks for itself."
The top priority for the bottom-six forwards, particularly those on the fourth line, is to be sound defensively, and the only goals-against for which any of them were on the ice Saturday came in unusual situations; Boyle and Rodrigues were there for Alex Ovechkin's 5-on-3 power-play goal and Carter was on for both of the Capitals' empty-netters.
"We want them to be trustworthy and reliable, defensively," Sullivan said. "Get defensive-zone starts. Win faceoffs. Help us gain momentum by being good on the forecheck. And if they can chip in, offensively, obviously, that's a big bonus."
Carter's line, as currently constituted, has some offensive potential, although Kapanen and Rodrigues might have more luck finding an albino unicorn in their lockers than they have finding the back of the net lately.
That isn't necessarily the case with the fourth line. Boyle has exceeded all reasonable expectations by scoring 10 times this season, but Blueger has one goal in 16 games since returning from a broken jaw and Heinen, arguably the favorite to sit when McGinn returns, has shown a touch a times this season, but has just three goals in the past 26 games.
That means those guys are expected to concentrate on parts of the game that are as glamorous as a dirty mop, handling the blue-collar chores that rarely show up in the scoresheet but can have an impact on what appears on the scoreboard.
"We have to defend hard and be hard to play against, first and foremost," Blueger said. "And kind of progress from there."
While that progression doesn't always lead to the kind of complementary scoring the bottom two lines contributed against Washington, Boyle noted that his unit -- which he described as a "straight-lines line" -- tries to chip in in other ways.
"We try to add an element to the game," Boyle said. "There are three zones. We want to be perfect in all three. It's not always going to happen that way, but if we can create some offense -- if we can put a couple in the net, too -- that's a big boost for our club, with all the talent that we have (elsewhere in the lineup).
"But we want to make sure we can at least grab momentum. As it goes along, there are going to be games and shifts where not a whole lot happens. It's going to be more tight-checking. We want to be really, really stingy in that regard. That's what we take a lot of pride in."
Boyle, with 864 career NHL games on his resume, also adds a dimension that only a handful of teammates could, and even fewer seem inclined to.
He's proven willing to speak candidly about the Penguins' shortcomings when they fail to perform to expectations, as was the case when they pretty much wilted during the third period against Washington.
"We weren't good enough," Boyle said. "That's not OK."
Even if their bottom two lines probably were.