The expectation was that the Calgary Flames were going to be in for a long night on Sunday.
The Seattle Kraken were dressing many of their veterans for their pre-season opener in front of their home fans, after all, and the Flames had sent a young, inexperienced group. Even if the result wouldn’t matter, you’d expect a team backstopped by Philipp Grubauer and featuring guys like Jaren McCann and Jordan Eberle to steamroll a group of Flames prospects, right?
Wrong.
Clark Bishop opened the scoring for the Flames just a few minutes into the action and then two goals apiece from Matthew Coronato and Adam Klapka and another from Jeremie Poirier helped the Flames cruise to an impressive 6-1 win.
It might have only been pre-season, but there was a lot to like In Sunday’s performance.
Here are three takeaways from the Flames’ pre-season opener:
CORONATO MAKES HIS CASE
The Flames have a good bit of depth on the wings heading into the season, and head coach Ryan Huska has been pretty clear that a guy like Coronato needs to out-play the competition if he wants an NHL job.
On Sunday, the second-year winger started making his case.
He’s going to have to make himself indispensable if he’s going to win a job, and he might have been the best player on the ice for a seriously undermanned Flames team.
Coronato scored the Flames’ second goal of the game and then set up Poirier with a ridiculous backhand saucer pass to make it 4-0. He added another helper, too.
Coronato had a strong training camp last year and played well in the Flames’ exhibition games, too, but it didn’t necessarily translate into a productive regular season. That makes it hard to tell exactly what he needs to do over the next few weeks to beat-out veterans on the wing.
It’s hard to imagine him getting off to a much better start than he did on Sunday, though.
KLAPKA UNMISSABLE
There are a number of guys we could highlight here. Clark Bishop opened the scoring for the Flames and is still a dark horse to wind up getting fourth-line playing time this year. Sam Honzek had two assists and looked much more confident at this level than he did a year ago. Artem Grushnikov got in a fight and had an edge to his game all night.
Klapka had a game that makes you wonder what we’re going to see from him this year.
Yes, he scored twice and threw a few big hits. But he also just generally imposed himself on the game. On his second goal, he accelerated into the defensive zone to break up a Berkly Catton breakaway, and then just a few seconds later he was burying a rebound on the other end.
Impressive stuff, and the type of performance that was impossible to ignore.
WOLF ON POINT
Dustin Wolf stopped 33-of-34 shots he faced on Sunday and looked sharper than you’d expect from a guy who hasn’t played a competitive game in five months.
The starting goaltending job won’t be won in one night. Wolf and Dan Vladar are going to be competing for playing time throughout training camp and even into the regular season.
But based on this extremely small sample size, Wolf is picking up right where he left off last spring.