[Red Slinger]

I thought it was a very positive night overall.

In Calgary, the NHLers dominated for about half the game and then set it on cruise control.

I was pleasantly surprised with Lucic. He looks like he fits better here than he did in Edmonton.

PTO guys: I was not impressed with DSP. For a guy fighting for his career he didn't make much of an impact. Rinaldo was so-so. I thought McDonald was solid.

Talbot looked lost and uncomfortable. It was like he couldn't find his crease. Hopefully that's rust or Oiler stink or whatever. We saw similar results with Dubnyk. Not saying Talbot is gonna be Vezina candidate every year but he obviously has some bad habits to shake off. Hopefully he can.

The baby Flames in Victoria looked really good too. Dube and Phillips in particular were buzzing. Also the goalie Zagiwhatever looked very comfortable. His movement and body language reminds me a little of Kiprusoff. I look forward to him being the starter or co-starter in Stockton. Parsons is very fast but also a little chaotic. He needs to quiet his game. Rieder is fast and works hard but doesn't have much finish. He could potentially be a good energy/PK guy but there's a lot of competition there.

Jankowski looked like he would rather be somewhere else. His spot on the team is by no means etched in stone. I think he was wearing a letter last night and was one of the more veteran players. The dichotomy between how he and say Giordano played in the other game was quite stark.

Stone looked tentative and rusty but settled down as the game went on. I think he'll be eating a lot of popcorn from the press box this year.

Both teams hopefully also learned a lesson that you can't take your foot off the gas, even in pre-season. Better to have that experience now than in the regular season.

It was awesome having hockey back. It was even more awesome having two games on at the same time.