Takeaways from Avalanche’s 5-3 win over Flames: The crowd was rockin’, and so was Mikko

Mikko Rantanen’s shot certainly wasn’t rusty after missing mostly all of training camp, was it?

“I had some extra time to work on it, I guess,” Rantanen quipped after scoring twice in the Avalanche’s 5-3 opening-night victory over the Calgary Flames at a rockin’ Pepsi Center.

Rantanen was grrrr-eat in his first real game since early May. Two goals, five shots on net, a patented one-timer from the right circle, wicked backhander to the top shelf. He will take off every training camp from now on, right?

“Don’t think I’m allowed to. Probably get fired,” Rantanen chuckled again.

Seriously, Rantanen was superb, and already that contract is looking like a bargain. I thought he was the best Avs forward overall, actually, and this is a guy who only started practicing this past Sunday.

“It’s all happened quick, but I felt surprisingly good today,” Rantanen said.

NOTES, OBSERVATIONS, TAKEAWAYS

• Rantanen’s fellow Finn countryman, Joonas Donskoi, was the other star forward in this one. Two goals, including the empty-netter that sealed it with 1:09 left. Donskoi said “I’ve been waiting for this moment all summer. A lot of emotions, I’ve been waiting for this day. To get a win as well, it feels good.”
• Philipp Grubauer, who finished with 27 saves, only had to face three shots in the first period. That’s tough on a goalie’s rhythm, and Grubauer called it “one of the weirdest games I’ve played in a long time. First two periods, I couldn’t really get into it. But I got more comfortable as the game went on.”
• I really liked what I saw from Valeri Nichushkin, in his first game as an Av. He was on the ice for two of the Avs’ first four goals, setting a good screen on the first one (Joonas Donskoi) and creating more traffic on another (J.T. Compher). He’s really big, skates well and…now if he could just score a goal. He had zero in 57 games last season with Dallas. But if he keeps playing like that, as a fourth-liner, he’ll be tough to get out of the lineup.
• Cale Makar had a couple of hiccups out there in his first career regular-season game. He lost a puck in the neutral zone, then when he got a stick on it, gave it away that led to a Sean Monahan breakaway in the third period of a 4-3 game. Grubauer bailed Makar out with a big save. Makar did get himself an assist, on the Avs’ fourth goal, by Rantanen. Nathan MacKinnon got the first assist with a great cross-ice feed.
• Nazem Kadri’s first game as an Av? Lots of hustle, lots of engagement. Nothing on the score sheet, but I liked his game. He does a lot of little things that don’t show up on the stat sheet, like diving to poke-check pucks away out of trouble, like he did in his own end in the third period.
• I liked the second line in general. I liked how Tyson Jost and Andre Burakovsky played. Burakovsky got his first career point as an Av on the first goal. He skates very well.
• I feel like the Avs gave a little too much ground in front of their own net tonight. Not that they were soft, but Calgary really had a lot of traffic in front of Grubauer at times. It just seemed like the Flames got to the net a little too easily at times. Or, maybe that’s just another way of saying Calgary has some pretty good players too.
• Remember that save on Mikael Backlund in which Grubauer did the splits last year in the playoffs? He made another similar save late in the third on Backlund to keep it a 4-3 game.
• The Avalanche’s new victory song in the locker room: “Stayin’ Alive”, by the Bee Gees.
• Jared Bednar said there was a lot he liked from his team, and some stuff he didn’t like. Pretty much everyone except on the defense, except Sam Girard, had some good – and bad – moments, he said.
• Nikita Zadorov, who eliminated Austin Czarnik on a big hit, then took a punch in the face from Milan Lucic in retaliation, finished a plus-3 with three hits.
• Matt Calvert made a great pass to J.T. Compher for the Avs’ third goal of the game. That’s the kind of contribution from the depth lines that this Avs team likely will get more of than last year’s team.
• You want fancy analytics charts? I got fancy analytics charts. Here’s the Corsi puck-possession chart, courtesy of Natural Stat Trick. This shows that the Avs controlled the puck a lot more than the Flames. Well, except for most of the third period.

• Quote from Joe Sakic coming off the elevator: “81 more to go.”
• I’m hearing from a lot of angry Avs fans who couldn’t see the game on TV, even in places like three or four hours away – or more – from Denver. Please leave a comment if this was the case with you. Did you watch the game, somehow, some other way?