Good Thursday morning!

• "This SUCKS!"

So exclaimed Erik Karlsson, loud enough to be heard throughout the locker room late Wednesday night at the Lenovo Center.

"Sick of this!" he'd keep going. "This SUCKS!"

Yep. He's right. In fact, I'd say he's as dead-on as he was in scoring twice amid the Penguins' latest overtime loss, by a 6-5 count to the Hurricanes. Because that's now a 5-16 record in games that go beyond regulation, including the ghastly 1-10 in shootouts.

Truth be told, there was a ton of stuff that sucked here, not least of which was the figurative final breath being sucked out of the conclusion of a five-game, eight-day trip that'd wind up 2-1-2 when it could've been ... well, better. There were giveaways galore, infinitely more than the 16 officially registered. (Like, there were that many giveaways just inside the Pittsburgh blue line alone.) There were missed assignments allowed. There was a short-handed goal allowed on a 100-foot breakaway. There were 45 Carolina shots and a mind-bending 82 shot attempts, or more than one for every minute of action. All framed around an especially awful first period in which the visitors might've trailed by a dozen.

Want to know something, though?

I'll take it all:

I’ll take the good, the bad and the uncharacteristically ugly, and that's wholly because I'll also take Stuart Skinner's Stanley Cup playoff-level goaltending in stopping 39 of those 45 shots, with several of those save reaching into outrageous status.

"He made so many big saves for us," Bryan Rust would say. "He's the reason that game wasn't 10 or 11 to 5. I think we definitely needed to play tighter defensively, but he made some unbelievable saves for us."

"Stu was excellent here tonight," as Dan Muse would say before anyone had a chance to bring him up. "He's a huge reason we got a point again."

Heck, Skinner was so good that one of the world's most modest men couldn't resist this magnificent assessment of his own performance: "I felt really good. And I think that's why I'm really annoyed right now, because I let in six goals. Wouldn't have expected that. But it's a hard game. It's a hard league. These guys know how to score goals. They know how to make plays. And they got lucky on the six-on-five goal."

The Hurricanes really did. K'Andre Miller's harmless flick from the left side caromed behind Skinner off Parker Wotherspoon's leg with 2:51 left in regulation to tie, 5-5.

"Sometimes," Skinner continued, "luck kind of goes another team's way."

Nothing lucky about the winner, though, Sean Walker booming a one-timer from the left dot from Sebastian Aho, who'd dangled long enough to take down a Sloppy Joe:

Whatever. Again, that overtime never comes close to occuring without Skinner.

Not going to lie here: I've had doubts about the position. And I've expressed those, including my worries back when Tristan Jarry was traded following the fine few months he'd had, including a 9-3-1 start and .909 save percentage.

But between seeing Arturs Silovs solidify and seeing this Edmonton-Game-7-tested version of Skinner, I'm more than coming around to the possibility that the Penguins could benefit from, as opposed to overcoming, their goaltending in the games that matter most: Since his arrival, Skinner's 9-5-5 with a 2.88 goals-against average and .889 save percentage, none of that spectacular but all of that serviceable. Doubly so if, as occurred in Edmonton, he'd rise up in correlation with the competition. And Silovs has gone 15-9-8 with a 2.90 goals-against average and .895 save percentage.

Long way to go. Lots of relevant hockey left. 

Ideally, there'd be not one but two easy choices for Game 1.

• The hockey world's always a better place when Sidney Crosby's no longer sharing a press box with me, and it's that much more fun to see him score right away:

Also tipped one home on his first shift, too. But in reality, he needed both of the first two periods to find his full footing and start flying around, as he did in the third.

"That's normal," he'd tell me afterward. "It's not all gonna be there right away."

Still encouraging, though. No visible issues with the knee, even when noted lumberjack Andrei Svechnikov whacked him on the back of that same knee in an unpleasant exchange between those two in the second.

Taylor Haase has exclusive reporting on that scene.

• Can anyone explain why no one seems to talk about Karlsson as a Norris candidate?

Since the Olympic break alone, his 17 points -- five goals, 12 assists in 12 games -- are fourth-most in the NHL of all skaters, trailing Nikita Kucherov with 20, and Martin Necas and Connor McDavid with 19 each.

My friends, this is nothing less than the Ottawa edition of the man.

• And yeah, I did speak with him once he settled a little:

• It's hardly part of my job description to offer excuses for a team I'm covering, but these guys have been through a wringer and a half, with all the travel and 12 games in 21 days. The next two days will represent their first back-to-back days off since the Olympics.

And they still pounded home a handful of goals and roared throughout the third period.

"We have things to clean up, especially from the first two periods," Muse would say. "I thought, in the last 20, we got more in line with the game we wanted to play. It is a credit to the guys, that willingness to battle."

• The Hurricanes deserved to win both these games, and they'll deserve being Metro champs ...

NHL

... but that doesn't mean I've got to respect all aspects of how they play.

I wouldn't miss this morning's Daily Shot of Penguins podcast, in which I ask Wotherspoon about Taylor Hall's incessant diving and ... yeah, I don't exactly stop there.

• Rust pulling away from Jaccob Slavin for his breathtaking breakaway goal in the third might've been a season highlight for me. Hockey at its purest is a simple foot race.

• Ben Kindel was flying on his own breakaway goal in the third, and he now needs one more goal to score his age. I'll say it again: Imagine a teenager potting 20.

• Elmer Soderblom will want back his reverse pass up the boards that gave the Hurricanes an odd-man break and a goal, but the kid also had just spent forever trapping a puck against the Carolina end boards, and that's a tremendous trait for a 6-foot-8 forward to exhibit. Thought he showed well, overall, in replacing Blake Lizotte on the fourth line.

• Connor Clifton can't match up against opponents like this. Might be Jack St. Ivany time.

• What, someone wanted this to go to a shootout?

• That's it for the trip. All five games, all eight days, all three time zones, all the takeoffs and landings, all the check-ins and checkouts, all the freebie breakfasts and midnight Uber Eats ... and it's back to the good place. Taylor and I covered it all. Thanks for coming along.