[Cali Panthers Fan]

Firstly, for those who are banging on Colborne already, give him a break. He was forced into the lineup early before he learned Hartley's system. A few days and a handful of practices is not a lot for him to get up to speed. Not to mention he didn't have the conditioning drills that the other players on this team did, so he's likely to be behind the pace a little. I thought his decision making was solid and he was trying to take care of his own zone first. Nothing wrong with that.

Hudler was really good, and even when he made a mistake he would make up for it. He's a very craft player with his stick, even defensively.

Baertschi looks much better in his own zone and neutral zone. You can tell he's distracted offensively though by trying to make sure he takes care of his own zone first. He was the other guy covering for a pinching defenseman on several occasions. I would like him to try and fight through his checkers a little more as that seems to be how you create a defensive breakdown in the NHL these days, but everything else in his game was pretty good last night. He will get better as the year goes on, I'm sure of it.

Brodie looked much, much better tonight. I'm very impressed with how he uses his body well to position himself between players and pucks, he skates it out of trouble effortlessly, and always makes a solid first pass. If they were stuck in the D-zone with him on the ice, it was always because the forward didn't chip the puck out or turned the puck over at the blue line. Pretty great game from Brodie IMO. Honourable mention to Kris Russell for being Brodie light and not bad in a top 4 role.

I really like D. Jones' game out there. Very tough and physical, while driving the net hard on every shift. Our last RW power forward stopped playing like that years ago. I'm glad to have a player like that again.

McGrattan has been amazing so far by drawing penalties, skating hard, and backchecking well, and that's not even what he's on the team for.

Galiardi showed up to play tonight and really looked like he wanted to make amends for his dumb play last night. I love a player that holds himself accountable. We've been missing that for some time.

Glencross looked really lazy for the first period again. He did a poor job of covering on the PK leading to their first goal. He made some better plays as the game went on, but for a team built on good hockey I.Q., he sticks out like a sore thumb.

MacDonald did enough to get the win and was solid, but he always takes way too long to get across to the other side of the net. That trait led directly to the 3rd goal tonight and that's the difference between a starter and a backup. Ramo didn't blow me away in the first game either, so goaltending might be an issue if they don't improve a little this year.

Shane O'Brien is a dirty, dirty player. Not only that, he is still pretty bad defensively and takes a lot of penalties that he doesn't necessarily need to. Quite frankly, I believe he will be gone as soon as Sieloff is ready.

I really want to give credit to Bob Hartley and Jay Feaster. Feaster got rid of the dead weight and brought players in who want to contribute and be part of the team ethic. Hartley has taken that group and managed to get them all to buy into the team concept, along with great conditioning and work ethic. I love the never quit mindset, even when things look bad out there. There will be some ugly nights this year because the talent level still isn't that high, especially in goal, but I'll take this kind of effort even 75% of the games year. Much more enjoyable to watch than the last few years.