Penguins’ Stuart Skinner Admits Playing Against Oilers Was ‘Super Weird’

The Pittsburgh Penguins hosted the Edmonton Oilers on Tuesday, which saw goaltenders Stuart Skinner and Tristan Jarry play against their former teams.

Pittsburgh and Edmonton pulled off a four-player deal on Friday that was headlined by Jarry going to the Oilers and Skinner going to the Penguins. On Tuesday, the two teams played, and Skinner admitted the first couple of minutes of the game were weird for him as he was playing against his former team.

“Yeah, it was definitely different,” Skinner said postgame on Tuesday. “Super weird, like, taking a nap and thinking that I’m playing the old team.

“So, the first period, I feel like for the first five minutes I kind of had to settle my game in and calm my mind down. And as the game went on, I think I did a better and better job at that.”

Skinner ended up making 17 saves on 22 shots, as the Oilers cruised to a 6-4 win, with the sixth goal being an empty-netter. Although Skinner struggled early on, as Edmonton led 2-0 just over halfway through the first period, the goalie admitted the crowd cheering for him helped, as he made his Penguins home debut.

“It felt really good,” Skinner said. “I saw a couple (of) signs out there, too. I saw a big face of me. It was nice. It was a great welcome. I really appreciate that from the fans. Just feels really good in my heart to feel that coming out on the ice.”

With the loss, the Penguins fell to 14-9-9 and are outside of a playoff spot as Pittsburgh has lost six-straight games, but four of them have come in overtime or a shootout.

Pittsburgh will return to the ice on Thursday on the road against the Ottawa Senators.

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