Goalie Semyon Varlamov was excellent - the Avs defense was shaky early and Varlamov made some big saves. Too bad he lost the shutout at the end. Patrick Roy in his post game press conference said Varlamov was the #1 star.
Ryan O'Reilly had the play of the game with a great steal and score to put the Avs up 1-0. Good to have Radar this season from game 1.
This was my first look at Nathan McKinnon as I didn't see any of the Avs preseason games. He's going to be fun to watch. I was impressed by his speed and he had two nice passes to setup goals.
I heard an interview with Patrick Roy yesterday morning where he said he would be calmer as a coach than he was as a player. I said to my wife, "we'll see how long that lasts." Not very long, as last night's post game tirade showed!
I thought the Avs played with a lot of energy and passion, and Roy has to have something to do with that. It's easy to play hard on opening night in front of a near sell out crowd but I have a feeling we won't see the Avs take too many nights off with Roy behind the bench.
Next week's road trip to Toronto, Boston, and Washington may give us more of an early indication of how good this team is, but last night sure was everything an Avs fan could have hoped for in an opener.
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