The post-overtime shootout is in its fifth season in the NHL, and the added action certainly has made for a thrill ride for spectators. It's also been a reputation-maker for one of the League's unheralded scorers.

Earlier this week, Jussi Jokinen became the first player in NHL history to reach 25 career shootout goals, and boy was his latest goal clutch. The injury-ravaged Hurricanes were in the midst of a 14-game winless streak and had blown a 3-0 lead against Minnesota, which rallied to force the shootout. Jokinen took Carolina's second shootout attempt and buried the puck past friend and fellow countryman Niklas Backstrom -- his second career shootout goal against him. It turned out to be the only goal of the shootout, and the 12,194 fans at RBC Center finally were able to enjoy a victory.

"He's the guy I practiced the most against in Finland because we've been playing on the same team for years and we practice shootouts with each other in the summer time," Jokinen said of Backstrom. "I didn't want to shoot against him because he knows me too well. It was a big mental battle."

To understand how accurate and clutch Jokinen has been in the shootout, you have to go back to his rookie season of 2005-06, the first season the tie-breaking procedure was used. Jokinen had joined the Dallas Stars after a moderately successful Finnish league career, and he was coming off a career-high 23-goal season with Karpat Oulu.

Jokinen scored 5 regulation goals in his first 12 games with the Stars, but his burgeoning legend was born in game No. 14 on Nov. 5, 2005. In the first shootout in Dallas team history, Jokinen scored against goaltender Peter Budaj on the team's second attempt (Sergei Zubov scored on the first attempt), and the Stars earned a 3-2 victory at Colorado.

And Jokinen kept scoring.

He scored on the first nine shootout attempts of his NHL career, beating such All-Star netminders as Evgeni Nabokov, Jean-Sebastien Giguere, Tim Thomas and Manny Legace. He also burned Martin Gerber, Curtis Sanford, Michael Morrison and Budaj a second time. It wasn't until March 18, 2006 that Jokinen was stopped, by Vesa Toskala of San Jose.

In his rookie season, Jokinen scored 10 shootout goals on 13 attempts for a 76.9-percent success rate. Three of his scores were game-deciding goals.

Jokinen's nine consecutive shootout goals remains a League record. Other shootout records he owns are most career goals (25), most goals in one season (10, tied with Wojtek Wolski), and most career shootout attempts (46, tied with Ales Hemsky). Jokinen's 8 career game-deciding goals are three behind leaders Ales Kotalik, Vyacheslav Kozlov and Sidney Crosby.

One of the moves Jokinen has utilized in the shootout is "The Paralyzer," in which he switches from forehand to backhand, skates toward one post while dragging the puck across his body with one arm, sliding the puck into a mostly empty net. The goalie usually follows the direction Jokinen skates in while the puck stays wide.

"The Paralyzer" earned Jokinen the nickname "The Finnisher."

Players who excel in the shootout -- those that can remain calm and not buckle under the one-on-one pressure before an arena full of screaming fans with the game on the line -- are a commodity in today's NHL. When Carolina GM Jim Rutherford traded for Jokinen from Tampa Bay on Feb. 7, 2009, he understood this. And all it cost Rutherford was an underwhelming package of Wade Brookbank, Josef Melichar and future considerations.

"Certainly that is an added bonus," Rutherford said of Jokinen's shootout prowess.

"I think you could carry a guy on your fourth line that you consider a specialist, a real solid fourth-line player that can be a difference-maker in the end," Rutherford said. "It would kind of be like in baseball where you have the pinch-hitter. He doesn't play every day, but he's a guy that can come off the bench and make a difference in the game."

To date, Jokinen has 59 regulation goals in 326 career games. But his ability to deliver in the clutch, to finish a game and not only in a shootout, is undeniable. In the playoffs, where there is no shootout, Jokinen continues to amaze, with 9 goals in 27 postseason games. Seven came last season, and several in dramatic fashion:

* He scored with one second left in the third period to defeat New Jersey in Game 4 of the teams' first-round series.
* He scored the game-tying goal with 1:20 left in third period against New Jersey in Game 7.
* He scored in overtime to defeat Boston in Game 3 of the conference semifinals.
* He broke a 1-1 tie in the third period to defeat Boston in Game 4.

In all, Jokinen scored 3 game-winning goals in the 2009 playoffs. In one stretch he scored 4 goals in six playoff games after netting only 7 goals in 71 regular-season games.

"Everyone wants to play their best in the postseason," Jokinen said. "... It's the best time to be a hockey player."

"Clearly the points in overtime or the shootout can be the difference of whether you're in the playoffs or not," Rutherford said late in the 2008-09 regular season. "I can go to one game that we had with Buffalo at home (Feb. 26, 2009) that we won the shootout and it was Jussi's goal that did it. That one game alone and that one point can make the difference in us getting into the playoffs."

Carolina earned a playoff berth and the No. 6 seed with four more points than Florida, which placed ninth and out of the playoffs.

So far in 2009-10, Jokinen is off to a 3-for-5 start in the shootout and currently is tied for second in the NHL in shootout goals, one behind Crosby and Marek Svatos.

And so goes the remarkably clutch career of one of the NHL's great sure shots, "The Finnisher" and game-decider. In Carolina's 2009-10 media guide, Jokinen's entry states, "His first hockey memory is scoring the game-winning goal in a shootout in the final game of a tournament when he was 8 years old."

Not much has changed since.

Contact Rocky Bonanno at rbonanno@nhl.com