Kelsey Rust figured that she'd be babysitting a puppy for about a week when the Penguins went on the road for games in New Jersey, Columbus and Carolina last month.
She couldn't have had any idea that she'd still be sheltering the dog -- and its owner -- nearly a month later.
But when her husband, Bryan Rust, returned from Columbus on March 12 after the Penguins' game there had been postponed, he was accompanied by Zach Aston-Reese, his teammate and owner of the aforementioned puppy.
Aston-Reese and his dog, who normally reside in an apartment Downtown, have been with the Rusts ever since. And with no end of the NHL shutdown in sight, they figure to remain houseguests for the foreseeable future.
The same, it turns out, might be true of Rust's brother-in-law, who also is living there and has helped to create what Rust described Tuesday as "a bit of a full house."
Rust, speaking on a team-organized conference call, made it clear that he didn't mind Aston-Reese and his dog accepting an offer to move in while hockey season is on hold.
"He and I are pretty close," Rust said. "He gets along with me and my wife pretty well, and he's obviously a great guy, so that was kind of a no-brainer, to have them come stay with us.
"My wife has been really good with it all. She has a house full of boys. She's been awesome."
That would be a pretty apt description of the season Rust has been having when play was suspended, too.
He was the Penguins' No. 2 scorer, with 27 goals -- including a team-leading eight on the power play -- and 29 assists in 55 games. Assuming he was able to stay healthy, the first 30-goal season of his career was a virtual lock, just one year after he put up a then-career high of 18.
"I try not to think about (possibly being denied a chance to score 30)," he said. "For me, personally, it's been a really good year and I've been trying to take it one day at a time. I haven't really given that a thought. I'm just trying to see where this whole Covid-19 quarantine thing goes and the temporary stoppage in play.
"If we get back to the season and play regular-season games, maybe I'll be able to get there. And if we go right into the playoffs, that's too bad, but I'm still pretty happy with my season."
It's far from certain that there will be hockey again before next season, and a number of scenarios have been considered if play resumes this spring or summer.
Many call for going directly to the Stanley Cup playoffs after some form of training camp, and playing in neutral-site venues with no fans present seems to be a possibility.
That, Rust suggested, could have a profound impact on how games play out.
"The home-ice advantage, that aspect of it, might be taken out of it, the ability to ride the momentum of the crowd," he said. "Even during the regular season, but it's amplified so much more during the playoffs, when the crowd gets on your side and you have a big shift or a big play or something and then you just kind of ride that momentum.
"In an empty building, there wouldn't be as much of that. You'd have to try to create your own energy. That definitely would play a factor."
Although his teammates have scattered across North America and Europe, Rust said they have been able to use technology to remain in touch.
"You find yourself talking to quite a few of the guys," he said. "We have a group chat that's going ... pretty much every day. We have some decent contact with each other."
Rust and his co-workers had put together a 40-23-6 record, good for third place in the Metropolitan Division, when play was halted.
And despite a skid shortly before the stoppage during which they went 2-8, the Penguins were reasonably satisfied with how they had fared in 2019-20, in part because they'd lost 302 man-games to injury and illness.
"It's been a season of adversity," Rust said. "For us, whether it was all the injuries -- injuries to key players, or things like that -- we've had to overcome adversity. Depending on where this goes, if we come back this season, it's just kind of another hurdle that we're trying to overcome."
